


Pareidolia

by Paraph



Category: Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Action, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF!Loki, Chitauri - Freeform, Drama, F/M, Gore, Lady Loki, M/M, Other, Post Avengers (Movie), Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-10-20
Updated: 2013-09-23
Packaged: 2017-11-16 16:47:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 42,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/541675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paraph/pseuds/Paraph
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It doesn’t end in Central Park.</p><p>Five days after the battle of New York, the sons of Odin have returned to earth and Stark Tower. With them comes a new threat; one that has even the maniacally insane God of Mischief running scared. Throughout the city people are dying; murdered in horrific, unexplainable ways and their deaths are just the beginning, the first steps down a road that could lead to the destruction of the Nine Realms.</p><p>Now sides must be chosen and strange new alliances struck, to combat an enemy that lurks within.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

Life is fickle, a cruel child's toy, victim to the most callous of whims. Life is no guarantee. One can live and be betrayed, can have everything they hold dear torn away and continue on breathing. If there is one thing the void teaches him, it's this. To promise _life_ is to promise nothing.

There, in that emptiness, there is no air, no gravity to rip him apart. He seeks oxygen that is not there until his lungs burn like a brand has been set to them, until he writhes in pain and silently begs for the reprieve of death, but death never comes. In the void, there is no death.

Nor is there any sound and this, he soon finds; or perhaps he finds it late, it is impossible to tell time in a place of perpetual inconstants; this, is the cruellest denial of all. Over time, he learns to ignore his body's protests of need, learns to catalogue sensation and file it away as a distant notion. He gives up feeling and opens his eyes to the ever shifting gallery of distant stars; realms whose existence at these farthest branches of the universe fall beyond even Heimdall's all seeing gaze. Before his eyes, stars die and flicker into life, galaxies are consumed and for a brief instant, he feels wonder. But when he gives up pain, he gives up his mind's last true defence against the silence.

It creeps up on him slowly, _clever silence._ It's a persistent itch that grows and grows until he's mad with it. Until the silence; he's never paid heed to the constant companion that is the static rush of blood in his ears, the click of his blinking eyelids, the rhythm of his own heart. Without them, he begins to doubt. _What if,_ his mind whispers, _even he does not truly exist here?_ What if he is just another patch of emptiness in this barren void? _Consciousness without substance?_ That all consuming terror of inexistence is what finally sends his mind retreating in on itself, like a snake coiling protectively around its wounds. There in the deep recesses of memory his last vestiges of sanity seek a safe harbour; a happy reminiscence to hide in. But like a child who lies awake in bed, wracked with the fear of recent nightmares, only the bitterest and most hated of memories will come to him. Every hurt and disappointment, every betrayal in a millennia of life replays itself, and in the darkness he dissects them, _wallows in them._ The tinniest of slights soon becomes sinister. The most innocent of words take on hidden insults. _Suspicions become fact, doubts- conviction._

And just as silence made him retreat into unreality, it's the absence of silence that brings him back. He's journeyed so deep into the dark passages of his mind, that when he ceases falling and slams down on hard, unrelenting land, he thinks the pain is yet another memory; _a sunny day long ago when his horse turned her ankle and flung him from the saddle; wrenching his shoulder free from its socket and shattering his arm_ \- until the sound of his own screams ring in his ears, real and true and wonderful. _Not memory._ So, for what he thinks must be the first time in an aeon he opens his eyes and gazes out disbelieving at the grey, barren land where he has come to rest. Barren, he thinks, because what could live there, in a land of desolate stone and dust?

Later he'll wish he'd never discovered the answer.

The _Chitauri_ , that is what the few in their ranks intelligent enough to form words call themselves. Hulking creatures with a corpse's sallow grey skin and reptilian eyes that stare down at him with dark cunning; eyes that promise pain.

When the torture begins, as he knew it would, he thinks they must want information. Explanations of what he is and why he came. But the questions never come. They take their daggers and dig deep trenches in his flesh- they lash him till blood paints the floor, till the skin of his back falls away in ribbons and his voice goes hoarse from screaming and all the while they are silent. All too soon, the truth becomes apparent. For the Chitauri he is simply a source of entertainment. Something they can cut open and watch knit back together again. The trespasser from the sky, whose strange, warm flesh wells up red under their ministrations. _A novelty._

In the end, he supposes that novelty, the very oddness of him, is what brings word of his existence to their allies' ears.

_"They told me an infant god had fallen into their nets."_ Those are the first words he hears leave the mouth of the being he will come to know as Thanos.

The Chitauri come one day and drag him without explanation from his cell; drop him naked and half blind at the Titian's feet.

_"But you are no god."_

"What is it you want of me?" he growls back, voice rough with disuse. The figure who looms above him is little more than a shadow to his damaged eyes, but he doesn't need sight to tell him it’s not Chitauri. No, he thinks, feeling the invisible tendrils of power that radiate from the figure before him, _this being is something older_ and _far_ more deadly.

"I have come to make you a bargain."

"What kind of bargain?"

"I mean to build a weapon," the mysterious being rumbles. "A destroyer of worlds and you, little Jotun, _you_ and your magic will help me."

"And in return?"

"I will spare your life."

"My _life?"_ Laughter bursts from his throat, raw and unrestrained. _"My life?"_

"You laugh?"

"Life is fickle, _old man._ To promise life is to promise nothing. If you wish my allegiance you will have to do better than that."

"What then?"

"Retribution," he answers, visions of Thor; beloved Thor, beloved counterfeit brother, dancing through his mind, _"revenge."_

 

* * *

 

 

**Manhattan, New York** \- _five days after the Chitauri attack_

Like so many of the other scenarios in his life that had gone pear shaped in the end, Tony Stark was; _with only an infinitesimal margin for doubt,_ certain in retrospect, that this one could be blamed on the scotch. Had he possessed the sense to join Bruce in a glass of the 1999 Chateau Le Pin he'd uncorked, things probably wouldn't have gone straight to hell. Or at least they wouldn’t have taken the express lane.

But he’d just helped to send a homicidal Norse god back to the other end of the rainbow, there was a hole in the wall of his upstairs den big enough to drive an M551 through, Pep was gone for the week and life was too damn short to waste the amount of time that getting drunk on wine required. That latter thought predominating, he cracked a bottle of Glenrothes that was half as old as he was, poured two fingers worth, knocked it back and poured a chaser of the same. 

Outside, the city streets lay silent; pale, disconcerting impostors of their former selves. To the east and across the river the distant lights of Queens could be glimpsed, beckoning to the onlooker, but here in the blocks surrounding Stark Tower, its neighbours loomed dark and skeletal in the moonlight. Windows that had, not even a week prior, perceptually glowed with life and activity; ignoring such petty concepts as day and night, were empty. Devoid of light, stripped of the glass that would normally wink in cheery reflection as the world passed by outside, they stared blankly back; vacuous black pools in the buildings’ scared façades. 

Repressing a shiver that had nothing to do with cold, Tony drained a third shot and reached again for the bottle. Across from him, Bruce was tracing the pad of a calloused thumb along the lip of his forgotten wine glass, eyes intent on the dark world Tony had been contemplating moments before. 

This was a city too well acquainted with ruin, with loss. It and its people would recover from this trial as they had from those of the not so distant past, but the going was slow. This was destruction on scale that would have been hard, for many, maybe _impossible_ to comprehend before it had come to pass. Seventy _billion_ dollars. That was the number the lawyers had begun tossing around. A number that didn’t begin to take into account the economic repercussions of decimating one of the words leading business hubs and more importantly the loss of hundreds of innocent lives. The people could feel it though, could sense the sum of those incalculable numbers in their very marrow. He could see it in their faces as they shovelled glass from their shop doorways, in the weary set of their shoulders as they hefted plywood to board over the windows of rooms they might never return to and combed the rubble for loved ones they’d never again hold in their arms. He felt it too, a keen, bone deep ache that would not be ignored, could not be satisfied by all the scotch in the world. A lethargy had set in on the people of New York and spirit, Tony knew, was a far harder thing to mend than shattered walls.

The liquid fire of a fourth round was sliding across his numb tongue when JARVIS’s omnipresent voice split the brooding silence, making Bruce- _as of yet unaccustomed to the AI’s presence-_ flinch in surprise and momentary alarm.

“You have visitors Sir, at the 45th Street entrance.”

"Tell'em to make an appointment," Tony grumbled around the rim of his glass, shooting the other man an apologetic grimace.

"I've already made the usual suggestions Sir," the AI responded, apparently affronted by this possible questioning of his efficiency. "But the lady is quite insistent."

_"Lady?"_   Tony asked, his interest stirring. 

In the armchair across from him, Bruce had gone from surprised to concerned. _Ten to one,_ Tony reasoned, Bruce was wondering if agent Natasha Romanov had come around for a not-so-social-call. But JARVIS, Tony knew, was well acquainted with his phony ex-assistant and would have said straight out if  she was the one lurking on his proverbial front stoop.

"Let's see this lady, then," he instructed, sitting forward in his chair and turning his gaze expectantly towards the plasma screen on the south wall, but the screen remained dark.

_"Jaaaarvis?"_ he prompted.

"Might I remind you of your current romantic status, Sir?"

"What are you, a computerized chastity belt?” Tony scoffed, “Lets have visuals."

After a few pointedly disapproving beats, JARVIS complied and the screen came to life.Unpleasantly inhaling a mouthful of eighty dollar scotch the wrong way, Tony choked and proceeded to slosh the remainder all over his jeans. The pale, angry face of a young woman stared back from the screen _and what a face,_ her features were striking even in the entrance’s dim overhead lights.  A wide, darkly painted mouth, a slim patrician nose, sharp cheekbones and a delicate chin, all set off by a pair of bright, intent green eyes that gazed at the camera as though they could see Tony staring back.

Bruce let out a low whistle of solidarity. "Girl Scouts?" he offered, a weak chuckle hedging his words.

 "I know you can hear me," the woman on the other end of the video feed snapped- which took Tony a minute to parse, distracted as he was by the crystal clear, HD view of cleavage the security camera was also offering. 

"Drunk Girl Scouts?" he ventured, eyeing the second woman who was _standing_ \- and he used that term lightly- at the tower entrance. The buxom blonde in question was slumped heavily against her smaller, dark-haired companion, head lolling and mouth ajar. Clearly, Blondie (as he then mentally dubbed her) had gone one too many rounds with a certain pirate named Morgan. _And,_ Tony mused, maybe that was what had possessed them to wander through the ruined streets at this hour of the night. 

"We require assistance Stark!" the dark-haired woman practically shouted, her voice echoing shrilly through the speakers. 

And _once again in retrospect,_ that Camelot dialogue, coupled with the fact that her fiery green eyes were focused point blank on the lens of the hidden camera, really _should_ have tipped him off, but, well, _scotch._

"Umm..." Bruce hummed, as JARVIS chimed in helpfully- _"A paternity test in the making, perhaps?"_

Shrugging at one and pretending not to have heard the other, Tony set aside the empty tumbler and pushed to his feet.

_Hey,_ he couldn’t just ignore a couple of far-from-home-damsels-in-distress, now could he? He was Iron Man after all _and_ , a tiny, cajoling voice in the back of his head reasoned- _just because he couldn’t take the merchandise home, didn’t mean he couldn’t press his nose longingly against the glass every now and then._

"You're going down there?" Bruce asked doubtfully and moved to place his untouched wine on the side table. "There's something... _iffy_ about the conscious one." -and that had Tony grinning as he headed for the hallway and the elevator beyond.

 

_Also in retrospect,_ Bruce had a gift for stunning understatements.


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still getting used to the ins and outs of this site and I think I may have accidentally update this story last night, without actually adding anything when I tried to save this chapter as a draft! Oops! Apologies for any confusion that may have caused. I'm sure I'll get the trick of things around here soon. 
> 
> Also, to those of you who've wandered over from my FF.net account (where the first five chapters were originally posted)- I've been slightly tweaking the chapters I'm posting here. The main change being the switch in tense.  
> Hopefully it isn't too baffling!

It all came down to bureaucratic bullshit. That, Agent Nicholas Cadry told himself, was the thing that had landed him in the middle of this twenty man cluster hump the higher-ups called a reconnaissance mission. 

At approximately twenty-two hundred hours, S.H.I.E.L.D. surveillance had picked up a surge of gamma radiation over the area of Central Park colloquially known to the locals as ‘The Ramble.’ A patch of barely tended trees that, incidentally no _sane_ local would go within throwing distances of after dusk if armed with anything less than a grenade launcher. 

In response, the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division, had dispatched a team of twenty agents to survey the area and assess any potential threats. A reasonable response plan if ninety percent of the organization’s experienced field agents hadn’t been on inactive duty, awaiting debriefing on the events of the invasion an alien race had staged on New York five days earlier. As it was, field proven agents were rare as hen’s teeth and twice as hard to come by and Cadry, an ex-Army Ranger and eight year S.H.I.E.L.D. veteran, had been assigned a team of nineteen, fresh from the academy junior agents for manpower. Glorified door shakers. Make that eighteen. The one didn’t even qualify as a door shaker as far as Cadry was concerned. Ross, the agent in question and the main source of Cadry’s current distress, was a bright eyed, hyper caffeinated computer geek with too large eyes and more gadgets than common sense- a combined list of traits that Cadry would have considered grounds for homicide even if he had _not_ been assigned by headquarters to be the kid’s personal babysitter. Which he had, _in_ _the Ramble,_ without a single grenade launcher in sight. But Ross, as fate would cruelly have it, was the only available agent in the tristate area experienced with the trunkful of field equipment used to trace the anomaly.   

“There’s nothing here,” Ross whined for the second time that night, prodding impatiently at the touch screen of the device he was holding. “Not a trace.”

“Maybe your Geiger counter is on the fritz.” Surveying the surrounding trees, Cadry hooked a finger under his collar and pealed the fabric away from his sweating neck.

 They’d been on site for a quarter of an hour; fifteen excruciating minutes and so far his ‘team’ was operating with all the finesse of a second grade class on outing day. He’d given them the usual rundown; ‘ _don’t get your dumb ass killed, don’t shoot anything that can sue you later’_ and split them up into smaller two man teams. Now they were out ahead, combing the trees for any non-human life before he and Ross moved in. Off to his right, he could hear one of them crashing through the underbrush, raising a racket that could probably be heard all the way over in Riverhead. 

“What?” Ross sniffed and turned a look on Cadry that asked if he could really be _that_ ignorant. “This isn’t a Geiger counter.” 

“Yeah?” Cadry was starting to weigh the merits of abandoning the kid to the mercies of park dwelling hobos and bloodthirsty aliens alike. Unhooking his radio, he punched the call button. “Beta team, this is Alpha. Anything to report? _Over_.” 

With a crackle of static, the Beta team leader Macallan, came on the line. “All looking normal. _Over.”_

“What’s that?” Ross asked, blond eyebrows scrunching together, gaze rising from his _not-Geiger counter._

“One of the forward teams.”

“Not that,” Ross shot back. He was glancing from the trees, to the device and back again. “Almost looks like...” And then before Cadry could object, he was bounding off into the tree line like a young, meth smoking, gazelle

“Ross!” Cadry barked. Shouting into his radio he took off at a measured jog after the runaway agent. “Forward teams be advised, Ross is on the move and heading your way. Repeat, _Ross is on the move._ ”  Ahead of him Ross’ back was a blurry outline, appearing and disappearing in glimpses through the overgrown trees. The fool was going to run right into the path of the search party and get himself capped.  “Ross! Get your ass back here!” Low hanging branches slapped his face in stinging trails, his boots slipped and skid in the muddy turf. Cadry barrelled on, heedless, but he was rapidly loosing ground on his quarry. For a pencil pusher, Ross was damn light on his feet. _What had gotten into the idiot?_

The trees were growing denser and with it, the underbrush. Ahead Ross’ shadowy outline blinked out of view behind a particularly thick copse, then reappeared for a spit second only to vanish again over an embankment. “Ross!” Cadry called with all the force his protesting lungs could muster. Once upon a time, he’d run the two mile without breaking a sweat, but those were bygone days. 

A commotion of snapping twigs and curses answered his shout, followed by an telling splash. So, _Ross had found the stream._ All the better, because Cadry was going to kill the kid the moment he laid hands on him and drowning would be as effective a method as any. Panting, he trudged up the embankment at a considerably more sedate pace. Maybe he would have to start ordering his lattes with skim. “Ross?” he called, cresting the rise. _No answer._ “Ross?” 

Below him the stream bed lay in darkness; the occasional pinpoint of moonlight that lanced through treetops to glitter on the water, the only illumination. 

“Ross?” 

_Still nothing._

Had the kid fallen and cracked his head on something? Cadry couldn’t see shit out here. The meadow they’d been waiting in had been lit by lamplight, but this far in there was nothing. Fumbling at his belt, he unclipped his flashlight and clicked it on, flooding the area in bluish-white light. Directly ahead of him the ground sloped down to a shallow stream that ran horizontal to his position. Pausing where he was he swept the flashlight beam along the bank. Fallen leaves and human detritus gleamed wetly in the light, disturbed here and there where someone had recently passed through. Only, _no_ that wasn’t all, near the very edge of the stream a wide swath of the ground cover was strewn, trampled into the muddy bank. Had one of the forward teams passed this way? 

With a huff, Cadry descended, sweeping his flashlight further down the length of the stream. Where the hell was Ross? He considered calling out again, but some innate sense stilled his tongue.It was those disturbed leaves. Something about them was off. Reaching the water’s edge, he surveyed the spot in question. Vegetation and garbage had been crushed down in a wide, irregular patch. Not the passage of two booted men. Nor for that matter was it the marks of someone taking a tumble down the slope. What it most resembled, in point of fact, Cadry thought, was a wrestling match. Even as the realization dawned, the sound of crackling leaves on the opposite bank reached his ears. _Damn._ Taking a rapid step back from the stream Cadry drew his sidearm. 

“Chief?” the voice that drifted though the air was an undulating off key, gurgle.

Falling back into a firing stance Cadry leveled the Heckler & Koch HK45 on the source of the noise. “Ross, is that-” the words died in his throat as his flashlight’s beam came to rest on the figure on the opposite bank and he stared, transfixed, froze in horror and disbelief. It was Ross’ lanky frame standing before him; his curly blonde head, his regulation pants and blazer, _but the face._ Sweet mother of God, _the face._ It was twisted, _malformed_. The jaw lolled, the eyes were jittery white orbs and the nose was... _missing._ Voice still trapped in his throat, Cadry took a step back, the light vibrating in his hands. 

“Whats’s the matter, Chief?” the thing before him inquired in that same gurgling sing-song. “Didn’t-” its face spasmed, muscles bulging and twitching. With a sickening crack of taut tendons, the jaw snapped into place, “-you want me to wait for you?” It grinned at him, rubbery lips drawing back to reveal blackened teeth and that’s when a blow came from behind. The force of the hit punched the air from his lungs. Stumbling forward, he tried to swing his weapon around to face the attacker, but his balance was off. He fell to his knees, something hot and wet spilling down his legs. 

As the flashlight slipped from his grasp and went rolling away, the beam fell back on him just long enough to illuminate the six inches of cold, dull metal protruding from his chest. 

 

* * *

 

For someone who was so desperate for his “assistance” the woman on the other side of the door did not look pleased to see him. Still balancing her inebriated companion, she stood there in her stiletto heels and red designer cocktail dress, glaring daggers at Tony as he disengaged the manual door locks.  

And although he’d had his fair share of dealing with enraged women in his forty-two years, generally they’d only turned murderous the morning after-  and then he’d normally pushed them off on Pepper. _What did one open with in this situation?_

Taking a deep breath- a bad move it turned out, as the extra oxygen only sent his already swimming head into deeper water; he pulled open the door. 

Talk, small or otherwise however was rendered unnecessary. At the same instant the door swung open, the blond went toppling forward. Sliding from the dark-haired woman’s hold, she swayed unsteadily and then fell straight into him, knocking him back and sending them both sprawling in the process. They hit the floor with a crack, Tony taking the brunt of the fall. If he’d had any air left in his lungs, he’d have yelled timber. 

For a moment he lay there stunned and winded, head spinning while the blond’s not-inconsiderable weight pressed down on him. _Jesus,_ he mused once his skull had stopped pounding enough to allow for linear thought a few seconds later; _this chick weighed a ton_. So much for the damsel in distress theory. All this woman has to do was sit on potential attackers. _Threat neutralized._

Aloud he managed to wheeze: "I think you dropped something," and turning his head to the side spat out a mouthful of the golden hair that was attempting to smother him.

"I did indeed," the second woman said, nonplussed. The points of her heels echoed through the reception area; _click, click, click_ and then she was standing over them, a blurry outline behind the curtain of hair. "Stark, we must get him out of sight."

_Him?_ Tony's brain screeched to an grinding halt. _Him?_ Was this gal nuts? Or had he just hit his head harder than he thought?  Wiggling a leg out from under the unconscious woman’s he tried to lever up a hip, to no avail. Blondie was the definition of dead weight. Incredible really, considering the size of her. Tony was no heavyweight, but if she was bigger than a size three, he’d eat Steve’s shield. He tried a second time, bracing an arm under himself along with the leg. _No go._ “JARVIS!” 

"Do you require assistance sir?" JARVIS inquired serenely, causing the dark-haired woman to gasp in surprise. "This sort of... _thing_ , is normally Miss Potts' area of expertise, but I suppose I could-"

"Dammit JARVIS, just get me some help down here!"

"Silence Stark,” the woman snapped and something in her tone made Tony freeze. _He knew that voice. He was sure he did._ The answer was scrabbling, all razor sharp nails at the blurry edges of his booze drowned, oxygen deprived brain, but stubbornly refusing to surface. One thing he was certain of though?- _the answer wasn’t pleasant._

“You'll draw the entire planet’s attention if you don't stop squalling,” she added, her shadow falling over him. 

"Lady," Tony began, heart now pounding out an alarmed rhythm in his chest, “I don’t know what you’re up to-” he was cut short by a rush of oxygen flooding his lungs as Blondie’s weight lifted from his chest. With a thud she landed on the floor beside him, limbs akimbo, hair plastered to her slack face. 

The dark haired woman leaned over her on hands and knees, panting with exertion. 

"Curse the oaf," she gasped, her thin arms shaking with the effort of keeping herself upright. "Don't just lie there like a corpse,” she commanded, lifting her head to glare at Tony, ”seal the doors."

_“As I was saying,”_ Tony shot back, raising himself onto his elbows and into a sitting position. “I don’t know what you’re up to, _or,”_ he eyed her pointedly up and down, “ _where_ we’ve met, but I don’t appreciate being ordered around my own building while being glared at like I’ve just lost one of the royal Corgi.” Hands out to steady himself, he lurched to his feet. 

"Stark," the woman shouted, distracting him from the room, which had once again taken up spinning around him like a carnival fun house after his change in position. Listing precariously, he squinted down at her.

“Stark, if you don't desist in staring at my bosom and close those doors, so help me, I'll throttle you."

_And then,_ despite the fact that the body that familiar voice belonged to was also in possession of pale, willowy limbs and heavy breasts, despite the fact that he couldn’t see straight, much less think straight, Tony Stark realized _exactly_ where he knew it from.

_Shit-O-Damn_.

"Loki."

_"Obviously."_ The God of Mischief sighed, the roll of her- _his_ eyes that followed, practically audible.

"You wanna explain to me why the hell you and Dorothy aren't chilling in the Emerald City right now?" Tony demanded, backing away, barely hearing his own words over the sudden rush of blood in his ears. _Shit, shit, shit._ Adrenaline sang through his bloodstream, clearing his head like a liter bag of espresso via IV drip and everything jerked into stark, horrifying focus. The second woman, the unconscious woman, was Thor. Had to be. And Loki, bloodthirsty, insane, magic wielding murderer that he was, had both of them unarmed and at his mercy. 

Tony needed his suit, _now._

"Now," Loki drawled, brushing unruly strands of hair back from his face, “is not the time for explanations.”

"Couldn’t agree more.” Cool as could be, Bruce chose that exact moment to stroll into the lobby. Shooting a glance from Loki to Tony, eyebrows arching in something like amusement, he folded his arms across his chest. "Now's the time for you to step back from Thor,” he warned, “before I'm forced to redecorate another of Tony's floors with imprints of your face."

Head snapping around to glare at the newcomer, Loki let out feral growl. 

"Have I told you lately that I love you?" Tony asked. "Let's pick out curtains." His gaze intent on the snarling god, he took a step sideways, inching himself closer to his fellow scientist. 

"I prefer Venetian blinds." A smile threatened the edges of Bruce's mouth; twitchy and mercurial, betraying the barely controlled tension lurking under that calm façade."You don't want to do this the hard way Loki," he said, smile faltering as he turned his gaze to the god. There was an entreaty in those words, _a_ _plea_ and damn if Tony didn’t suddenly feel like a prick for being so happy he was there.

_Stress free work environment?_ Yeah, _right._

Loki was predictably unmoved. "We must get Thor out of sight," he repeated slowly, deliberate as someone explaining foolish things to equally foolish children. "I can't hold this glamour much longer."

Magic, _right._

"Yeah, well as much as I prefer you _with_ boobs," Tony said, "that's not a particularly titillating argument for making us do...anything." Titillating. _Hah._ Sometimes, he just made himself laugh.

_"No?"_ asked Loki, his snarl morphing into a grin, red lips drawing back to reveal a gash of pearly teeth. It reminded Tony of gaping wounds, of flesh hacked down to white bones. Repressing a shudder, he edged closer yet to Bruce.

 “I dare say the horde of Chitauri scouts who'll be assaulting your little stronghold the moment we're spotted, will do far more than ' _titillate'_ you." Loki’s manic grin didn’t waver.

"Chitauri...scouts,” Tony said slowly, cocking his head as he regarded Loki. “Uh huh, yeah, _no_. Nice try though, thanks for playing. See, maybe you didn't fully grasp this, since you were impersonating a floor stencil at the time and everything, but your little buddies got their scaly asses _nuked_. The Chitauri are over, finished, _done._ Kinda like-,” with a grin of his own he jabbed a pointing finger at the god, _“you._ ”

Loki blinked at him, his green eyes wide, seemingly confused. “Done?” he asked, face still blank, and then without warning a laugh burst from his mouth, a raw and utterly insane keen that echoed through the large room like nails being dragged across glass. The sound skittered along Tony's nerve endings, setting his skin crawling so hard he was sorely tempted to rip his shirt off and start checking for ticks. 

Taking an involuntary step back, he shot a glance at Bruce, but the entirety of Bruce's attention was centered on their caterwauling enemy. His expression was still calm, if a little perplexed, but Tony didn’t miss the way the fabric of his shirtsleeves bunched under his clenching fingers. 

"Done? " Loki said again, still laughing, his ivory shoulders shuddering in mirth. "Poor, naïve human, the war has only just begun."


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter kicked my butt. It just didn't want to cooperate. Thank goodness for my poor, hapless victim, Zak who let me run this by him again and again. You're too fab. (and patient) <3
> 
> And thank you everyone for your comments and feedback so far! They make my day! :D

It wasn't often than Tony found himself at a loss for words. This however, was one of those rare moments. Really, all he wanted to do was laugh. The current state of affairs had, he reasoned, reached a high enough level on the bizarre meter to warrant that. Did Loki seriously think they were that abjectly stupid that they’d fall for such a massive line of childish scare tactics?

"I’ve had about as much of this as I can take," was all he managed in the end and then, under his breath: “Be a pal Bruce? Make me a god shaped wading pool?" 

“Just keep tempting me. I might give in,” Bruce murmured back. 

"That would be quite the tactical blunder," Loki said, catching the exchange despite their hushed voices. There was still an amused edge to his words, but he was eyeing Bruce warily; like a cobra sizing up a mongoose and judging it not so easy a meal as he’d first thought. He hadn’t forgotten the thrashing the unassuming physicist's other half was capable of doling out. "Without my assistance," he added, glancing back to Tony, "you will not survive the coming battle."

"Your _assistance?"_ Bruce echoed, shooting a look of disbelief at Tony. But Tony was silent, _distracted._ His own eyes fell to the floor, searching. A familiar coppery sent was suddenly teasing his nostrils. He knew that smell only too well. There was blood in the air. Never a  good sign.

“Oh dear.” With a chuckle, Loki shook his head, hair slipping from behind his ears with the movement to obscure sharp green eyes behind an inky veil. _“You believe yourselves the victors._ Can you really be so foolish? Do you truly believe that that one legion was the sum of their numbers?”

“That’s a convenient revelation,” Bruce snorted, tearing his curious gaze from Tony’s own searching one. “You lose and now your buddies will come beat us up if you don’t help us?” 

“Never mind that for minute _,”_ Tony broke in, certain now he wasn’t just imagining things. “Who the hell's getting their invisible blood all over my floor?"

Behind the veil of hair the corners of Loki's red mouth curled in a begrudging smile. "Fear not Stark, the oaf is not wounded, just knocked senseless."

"Thoughtful of you."

Tossing back his head with a great sigh of annoyance Loki rolled his eyes heavenward, the gesture of a man beseeching patience. "It was not my doing. Do you think me so witless as to knock him about the head and then drag him here to crow over my accomplishment?"

"Witless, _no._ Enough of a conceited mental case? _Definitely."_

At his words Loki barked out another jittery laugh- or started to. Just as the sound had started spilling from his lips something bizarre started to unfold; the brothers, so real and solid just seconds before began to slip out of focus before Tony and Bruce's astonished stares. For a moment the image of the women blurred further, their outlines growing soft and then a ripple was passing over it, dissolving their visages like a pond's reflection shattered by a child's skipping stone. It was so unexpected that for a split second Tony wondered if he'd been drugged or _hexed,_ or if that last shot of scotch had finished off his remaining brain cells. Before he could so much as verbalize his surprise though, much less ask Bruce if he was seeing it too, the strange kaleidoscope of shapes and colours was re-solidifying, forming back into two very familiar, very _male_ shapes.

Letting fly a long, irate litany of words that Tony couldn’t decipher- _didn’t have to_ , to know they weren’t in any way, shape or form polite- Loki, back in normal form, dropped to the floor beside Thor. 

"Well, that answers one question," Tony said through his teeth, the contents of his stomach shifting ominously at the sight of Loki’s revealed back. A ragged, fist-size hole had been torn through the god’s armour and the body underneath hadn’t fared much better. Dark blood ran like treacle from a patch of mutilated flesh just below his right shoulder blade. 

“ _Fuck,”_ Tony cursed, swallowing back nausea _._ There was exposed bone gleaming dully under all that gore- _muscle torn clean away-_ and the bone did _not_ look intact _._ He’d seen wounds like that before on dead men and on a few that were very close to expiring, but never someone alive _and_ ambulatory and it was disconcerting as hell. How was Rock of Ages still functioning?

Seemingly unfazed by the injury Loki pushed himself back to his knees. More blood dripped from his nostrils, congealing like red icicles on his pale skin. Pierced lung to boot then, Tony reasoned. Gaze falling to his unconscious sibling, a frown fell across Loki’s features. Not simple annoyance now _._ There was something akin to fear in that expression. _“Thor,”_ he snarled. Grabbing the blonde by the shoulders- a sudden, frantic edge to his movements- he gave the larger man a violent shake. "Damn you Thor, wake up!"

_"Loki."_ Bruce’s voice had dropped a notch, warning. Hands hanging loose at his sides he took a step towards the pair. _"Put him down._ If it's a head injury-"

Spewing another alien curse, Loki dropped Thor to the floor and drawing his hand back, landed an echoing slap across the slack face. _"Brother, wake up!"_

Maybe it was the plea, maybe he was just sick of getting smacked around like a birthday piñata- Tony could only guess (and he'd have guessed it was the latter), but as Loki drew back for another blow, Thor's eyes snapped open. What happened next was a blur of movement too fast for Tony to follow. One second Thor had caught his brother by the wrist and the next, he had a thrashing, yelping Loki pinned under him.

"Where have they taken it?" Thor roared, face scant inches from Loki's. "Tell me! Where have they taken the Tesseract?"

"I know not," Loki wheezed. 

"Tell me!"

"Thor," Tony said. A cold, premonitory tingle was making its way up his spine. "What in hell is going on?"

Startled by his voice, Thor’s head shot up to stare at Tony, eyes wide and dazed. “Stark? How-"

And that’s when Tony had his second surprise of the night. Thor’s attention drawn briefly away from him, Loki vanished. _Disappeared into thin air._ No shimmer, no _'Beam me up Scotty'_ ray of light. He was there and in the blink of an eye, he was gone. Gaze jerking back to where his brother had been seconds before, Thor stared at his empty hands in mute shock.

"Sir," JARVIS interjected into the silence with the timing of a Shakespearian farce, “Agent Hill of S.H.I.E.L.D. is on the line. She says it's urgent."

"Have we been dealing with one of your brother's little magic tricks this whole time?" Tony demanded, barely hearing the A.I. "A double? Like those copies in Stutt-  Actually, you weren't around for that."

"I know of what you speak." Clutching a hand to his forehead, Thor staggered unsteadily to his feet. He was looking around the reception area, a disoriented glaze still in his eyes. "No, that was not one of my brother's illusions. He was flesh and bone."

_And blood,_ Tony mused, sparing a seething glance at the red smeared floor. _"So?"_ he prompted.

_"So,"_ Bruce answered, folding his arms. "Either you put acid in my wine, _or_ Loki can teleport."

"That..." Thor said, nodding in consideration as he pinched thumb and forefinger to the bridge of his nose, "...is new."

Tony lacked the energy to even roll his eyes. "So he could be- _anywhere_ right now."

"I think not," Thor said. "He is still weak from his match with Banner. If he magicked himself away, he can't have gone far. He is likely still within this stronghold."

"Well that's goo- _No,"_ Tony amended, "no, I have to admit, I like that idea even less." _All in all, this was not shaping up to be the best Wednesday night on record._ "JARVIS" he said, brain flipping over into action mode, “start running scans. We need to find Mr. Tall, Green and Homicidal, ASAP. Report any signs of life, anything out of place. If he can teleport, who knows what other tricks he's capable of pulling. He could be cloaking himself.”

“He’s wounded,” the Thunder God boomed, “he’ll be looking for somewhere safe. A place he can hide long enough to heal himself.”

“Like?” 

“Have you a keep?” Thor asked, hopeful.

“No King Canute, _I do not._ ”

“Sir,” JARVIS said, "I have located the intruder in your private workshop."

"My _workshop?"_

"He appears to be staying put, for the moment at least," JARVIS replied. "Agent Hill, on the other hand, is growing increasingly impatient. Under the circumstances Sir, it seems unwise to keep her waiting much longer."

“So stall her, tell her I'm in the shower, _hell,_ tell her I'm busy waxing my legs. Just keep her occupied."

"Very good Sir. I dare say she should find your second suggestion _most_ preoccupying.”

"If your..." Thor was eyeing random points on the ceiling suspiciously, _"servant,_ can direct me, I will deal with my brother."

Thor, _in his work room._ Tony couldn’t resist mental flashes of large, blond elephants playing toss with Fabergé eggs. Then again, what choice did he have? "You heard the man JARVIS, take him down the emergency stairwell. I'm thinking now's not the time for elevator 101."

"Certainly, Sir.- _Mr. Odinson,_ if you would proceed down the hallway to your left?"

"Talking houses," Thor muttered, turning away, one hand still clutching his head. "Most disconcerting."

“He looks... _concussed,”_ Bruce whispered, watching him go.

"I'm doomed” Tony said in way of agreement. Shaking his head to dislodge the image of his suit smoking and crumpled like an empty soup can, he made a beeline for the computer behind the reception desk. "Fury's going to pop his remaining eyeball over this." Tapping the touch screen to bring it out of sleep mode, he moved to pull up the login menu. "Assuming he doesn't already know."

"You're telling him?"

The question brought Tony up short. Fingers poised over the keypad preparatory to signing in, he glanced back to Bruce.

_"Tony,"_ Bruce said, laying a hand on his arm. "If by some insane chance Loki's telling the truth and we’ve got another wave of Chitauri coming, is that something you really want to let S.H.I.E.L.D. in on?"

_"What?"_ Incredulous, Tony yanked his arm free of Bruce's hold and turned to face the shorter man. _Bruce was the first one to fall for Loki’s Jedi mind tricks last time around,_ his subconscious sing-songed. _What if it’s happening again?_ But no, he reminded himself, that had been the Chitauri staff’s doing, not any power of Loki’s and the staff was now hundreds, maybe thousands of miles away, deep in the bowels of some remote S.H.I.E.L.D. research facility. It couldn’t be effecting them here.

"I'm not trying to be the team conspiracy theorist," Bruce said, raising his hands in supplication, "but I don't trust Fury and I sure as hell don't trust whoever it is that's really pulling the strings. If there's one thing that the Chitauri attack proved, it's that Fury's just one of the little Indians in this game."

For a moment they stared at each other unblinking, the air charged with nervous tension. And then just as quickly as it had formed, it faded away. 

"And the big chiefs really like their atomic thunder sticks," Tony said at length.

"Really, _really_ like them."

"Shit.” As the truth in Bruce’s words came to full fruition in his mind, Tony’s stomach managed inexplicably to inch its way even further up his throat. 

"If S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn't know, I don't see what we gain by telling them,” Bruce went on. “I mean, aside from nearly nuking one the most populous cities on the planet, what did they contribute to that fight?"

_Bruce was right._ Of course he was _and_ , Tony thought, if _he’d_ been thinking clearly himself and been a little less preoccupied with snapping at the first thing that moved, he would’ve been thinking the same. "Agreed,” he said, shoulders slumping in relief . Clapping Bruce on the arm he turned back to the computer. “But I'm still making you a tinfoil hat for Christmas,” he added. He punched in his access code.

“If we make it through Thanksgiving alive.”

“Thanks for that little ray of sunshine, Eeeyore, _now put your game face on.”_ Taking a deep breath, Tony brought up the main line. “Agent Hill," he greeted, mentally crossing his fingers as the battered looking agent appeared onscreen, "allow me to once again explain the concept of _consulting hours."_

"Stark, we've been picking up some unusual activity in your vicinity," Hill replied in her usual, icy tone. She was looking past him, eyes intent on Bruce. Trying and failing to look surprised at the sight of him. "Dr. Banner, we weren't aware you were still in New York."

_Liar, liar,_ Tony thought.

"Actually," Hill said, tone lightening, "you might be just the man to look at this." And Tony believed the hint of pleasant surprise in her voice about as far as he could throw the Chrysler building.

"I'm sorry?" Bruce said, aforementioned game face plastered masterfully in place as he stepped up to the monitor.

"According to our scanners, there was a blip of gamma radiation just over Central Park approximately ten minutes ago. It was very similar to the readings we got off the portal the Chitauri came through."

"Another portal?" Tony hedged, fully aware they were already treading thin ice. Either S.H.I.E.L.D. didn’t know the brothers were back on earth, or they were questioning his and Bruce's loyalties and offering them a rope to hang themselves with. _‘S.H.I.E.L.D. monitors potential threats,’_ a voice in his head intoned. What a perfect opportunity to weed out the weak links. 

"Not as far as we can tell. Our people on the ground at the anomaly site haven't reported anything out of the ordinary."

"I can't tell you much without seeing the scans," Bruce told the agent.

"Why aren't you dragging Selvig's Nordic ass out of bed and bothering him?" Tony asked, propping an elbow on the desk.

"Doctor Selvig is on medical leave.” Hill’s expression forbid further questions along that line. "I'm sending those readings over to you now."

Pulling down his glasses from their resident perch on his head, Bruce leaned in to examine the files that had popped up onscreen at her words. Tony stepped aside to give him access, making a show of pretending to read over the other scientist's shoulder. 

His mind was racing. 

_The time Hill had mentioned was wrong,_ assuming it was true, and not just misdirection on the agent's part. Tony hadn’t looked at the time, but he was certain that _at least_ fifteen minutes had passed since Loki and Thor had shown up at the tower. 

"I can't say with one-hundred percent certainty with this limited data," Bruce said, cutting through Tony’s calculations. He was studying one of the graphs as he spoke, eyes intent. "But this looks different, smaller. I think what we're seeing may be fallout from the blast."

Leaning in towards her own monitor, Hill frowned. "I don't follow you, doctor."

"The missile that Tony redirected at the alien ships it-” pausing to consider, Bruce pulled off his glasses, “it’s essentially no different than the fallout from a traditional atom-bomb. You can’t have a radioactive blast of that magnitude without fallout; fallout that could have potentially made it through the portal and back into our atmosphere before it was closed.”

"Radioactive fallout? What kind of danger does this pose to the surrounding population?”

"I certainly wouldn’t encourage naked sunbathing in Central Park, just to be on the safe side” Bruce said, straitening with a chuckle. “But radiation at these levels is unlikely to be harmful.”

It took every ounce of restraint Tony had to keep his face appropriately concerned and not burst out in gut wrenching bouts of laughter. If he'd ever heard a comparably massive line of crap before in his life, it had slipped his memory. If Hill had bought it though, well, that was another matter entirely. 

"Anything else?" he asked brusquely, feigning indignation. Under the circumstances, it didn’t take much acting. "As thrilling as being your reference desk is, we were actually in the middle of something." 

If they were going to get nailed, Tony preferred to cut to the chase. He could lie the pants off someone as well as the next guy, could keep his cool while doing it; private school and corporate boardrooms were fertile training grounds for that skill set. But all the skilful subterfuge in the world wouldn’t do an ice cube in hell’s worth of good if S.H.I.E.L.D. had already tracked the two gods to his door. All it _could_ do in fact was bury them in an even deeper hole.

"No." Hill said. No inflection in those words, but she was eyeing him. Doubtful, maybe a little curious. Giving him one last chance to come clean? 

Tony held his tongue; met her gaze with an eyebrow arched in question: _Well?_

Hill’s face broke into a grin. "You be sure to get those legs silky smooth Stark."

_"Funny,"_ he managed between grit teeth. It felt like his blood had suddenly gone on vacation from his brain. "Can't stop laughing."

"Dr. Banner, thank you for your assistance," Hill said, still smiling.

"Keep me posted if there’s any changes.”

"We'll do that. Dr. Banner, _Mr. Stark."_ The window went dark.

"Well, this just keeps getting better and better," Bruce said. He ran a hand through his hair, exhaling a jittery breath. He didn’t look calm _per se_ , but he wasn’t turning chartreuse either, which Tony counted as a win. 

"You have a promising career hawking used cars and bridges in Brooklyn."

"Think they'll buy it?" Bruce asked, sounding like he didn’t particularly care. 

"For a while." Sighing, Tony switched off the monitor. "JARVIS, how's our resident Thunder God fairing?"

"Better than the workshop, I fear."

"What?" Tony said in a squeak his voice hadn’t made since puberty.

"Thor is in, shall we say, a slightly _ill temper._ I think it would be best if you were to intervene."

The suggestion fell on deaf ears. Tony was already running for the elevator.

 

They could hear the boom of Thor's yell through the elevator's insulated doors. Straining like a runner at the starting line, Tony squeezed between them the second they cracked open and bolted for his basement workroom. At the door though, he skidded to halt, Bruce nearly colliding with his back.

The room was in chaos. Work benches were overturned, spilling mechanical components and equipment across the floor, his computers peeked from under the edge of the collapsed desk and in a nearby pile of detritus Dummy- brought from his workshop in Malibu- was on its side and flailing like an overturned turtle. But there was one thing and one thing alone that held Tony’s gaze- his suit. Along the west wall it stood in its case, mercifully, _miraculously_ untouched amongst the wreckage. 

_Can I get a hallelujah?_ he thought, releasing the breath he’d been holding since crossing the  threshold. Giddy with relief he turned his attention back to the problem at hand. At the far end of the workroom the sources of the destruction were at a stand off. Thor had Loki cornered, backed up against the last upright worktable and was bellowing demands. 

“You will take us there!” Thor shouted, his frame fairly vibrating with the force of his rage.

Loki remained unmoved in the face of the bigger man’s lung power, staring Thor down through slitted eyes. "You'd be killed before your feet touched their planets’ soil," he hissed, voice dripping scorn.  

Tony knew there was no telling what could turn this situation from dangerous, to deadly. The best plan was to keep a safe distance and give Thor a chance to get Loki under control. Clearing his throat,he waded in."So," he shouted, just as Thor opened his own mouth to unleash a fresh vocal eruption. "S.H.I.E.L.D. is hip to your magical mystery tour!"

Two gazes swivelled in his direction; one green, one blue and their dumbfounded expressions matched so perfectly, that for a second Tony couldn’t believe they weren’t related.

"Your little jest escapes me," Loki said, arching a haughty eyebrow; patronizing even as he swayed on his feet, one gentle gust of wind away from cracking his skull open on the edge of Tony's steel table.

"The old Tesseract mojo isn't the most subtle way to travel," Tony said, with a little patronizing edge of his own. Bruce was close on his heels, a silent, reassuring shadow. "They picked up the energy spike from your entrance."

"We did not travel to Earth using the Tesseract's power," Thor said, eyes narrowing as he turned back towards his brother. "It was already in the Chitauri's hands..."

 


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this update took so long. I've been under the weather the past two weeks and that really slowed me down! As always a big thank you to [Zak](http://anotherjourneybytrain.tumblr.com/), my wonderful beta!

It was the hush that sent Agent Brian Mcallan’s guy-wires zinging in alarm. Not that it was silent out, not be any means. Across the water from where he and his partner stood, the murmur of conversation floated from the night owls still nursing their drinks on the patio of the boathouse. The hum of traffic- a companion so constant that it was was little more than white noise to the born and bred New Yorker, filled the air.

  _But the birds_ \- the birds were silent and that unnerved Mcallan to no end. 

 Central Park’s avian inhabitants were accustomed to disruption, be it harmless late night joggers or junkies looking for a quiet patch of trees to shoot up in. Here, disruption was the norm and yet the canopy of leaves above them was silent. 

" _Beta team, this is Alpha, come in.”_ He jumped at the sudden squawk from his radio, earning a cackle from Abrams, who’d been scanning the shoreline ahead of them. 

Offering his partner a rude gesture in return, he unclipped the radio from his belt. “Beta team here. You find Ross?” 

Some minute earlier; _Mcallan hadn’t bothered to check the time;_ their mission leader Cadry had alerted them that Ross, the team computer guru, was ‘on the move’. Which McAllen took to mean that Ross, flighty fucker that he was, had decided to take an impromptu stroll through the trees. Mcallan wasn’t exactly keen on Cadry; the guy had delusions that he was Colonel Kilgore, but he wouldn't wish Ross on the Kaiser. 

 _“Affirmative,”_ came Cadry’s reply seconds later. “Looks like we’re all clear here Beta. Let’s rendezvous back at the staging grounds.”

 _Everything’s not clear,_ Mcallan thought, glancing from his radio, up to the trees. _Something’s off about this whole thing._ But since arriving in the park they hadn’t spotted anything out of ordinary. High school kids necking in the trees, a few homeless that were camped out for the night, _but beyond that-_  

“Roger that.” Replacing the radio, he motioned Abrams towards the boathouse. “Cadry says we’re packing it in, Lou.” 

 Shrugging, Abrams clicked off his flashlight. “Nothing like a wild goose chase in the dead of night, eh’ Mcallan?” he asked in his north woods drawl. 

 Mcallan was still staring at the trees. “Yeah...” shaking his head, he turned back towards the lights of the boathouse. _Maybe his sixth sense was on the funk after all._

 “You coming?” Abrams was already on the move, making his way down the sandy shore towards East Drive. 

Taking one last look around, Mcallan followed. 

 

* * *

  

"It was already in the Chitauri's hands..."

After a thousand years in his company, Loki had come to recognize that calm, rumbling tone. Thor, like the storms he wielded, was always most tranquil in the moments before he unleashed his full fury. _"Thor."_ Eyes narrowing in a silent threat, Loki took a step back from the Thunder God, slowly raising a hand in warding. 

"I warned you of this; that they would follow us." He longed to snap back in answer, but he knew he had to control his own building ire; it would only serve to fan the flames of Thor’s anger and Thor was teetering on the sharp edge of rationality as it was. The slightest push might send him over and have him once again throwing furniture in a childish rage. 

"What are they planning?" Thor demanded, voice placid even as his eyes flashed with the promise of violence. 

He advanced a step. Loki took another back to match him. 

It was a delicate dance. If Thor flew into another rage, Loki knew he wouldn't be able to escape and he could not afford to let Thor lay hands on him a second time. In the wake of the transportation spell he’d been forced to cast, his energy was nearly spent and his body was beginning to betray the strain. He could feel the blood still trickling under his armour; across his back and down his trembling legs, to pool in his boots- the wound showing no signs of closing. His body was still recuperating from his fight with the mortals and this was too much damage, too quickly. It couldn’t keep up. The realization galled him beyond words, but there was no denying it.

"I know not what they mean to do," he replied; speaking softly, soothingly, as he would to appease an angry dog, "only that they seek revenge."

"You lie."

Again Thor advanced and again he retreated. His spine connect with edge of the table, sending a sudden wave of pain lancing through his back. _Trapped._   "No," he managed through grit teeth, silently musing that he was down to his last line of defense. 

During his time with Chitauri he’d begun learning to harness the powers of his forbearers; those magics that seemed to come as naturally as breathing to the Jotun. Locking his knees, he exhaled, reached within to call up the ice that lay concealed in his veins. His control of his inborn powers was still clumsy at best, but they were powers that Thor  did not  know he possessed and that in itself, that element of surprise, gave him the advantage. 

"Do not toy with me brother." Thor's fingers twitched, tendons standing out taught and pale against his knuckles. _"Tell me."_  

Over Thor’s shoulder, the two humans were watching nervously, looking ready to bolt at the drop of a pin.

"As I just told you- ”

He saw the decision to attack cross Thor’s eye s an instant before he moved. Letting out an angry shout , Thor lunged at him, fingers reaching for his throat. He was fast, faster than one would have expected for someone so bulky, but Loki was faster yet. Striking out he latched onto Thor's unprotected hand. The result was instant and _vastly_ satisfying. Yelping in pain and surprise Thor yanked free from his grasp and stumbled back clutching his hand- _now sporting a perfect blackened outline of Loki’s own-_ to his chestand the look of undisguised revulsion on Thor’s face was almost worth having to resort to the powers of his heritage. _Almost._

 "Tut tut," Loki hissed, letting his own fingers fade from Jotun blue back to Æsir white. "So soon you forget your comrade's council. _You mustn't let them touch you."_

Thor stared at him, eyes wide in astonishment. "I will have the truth from you brother,” he said, nostrils flaring like a bull preparing to charge, “and if I must freeze off every last finger in the execution, so be it."

"I am telling you the truth , you bumbling fool!" Something suddenly snapped inside him. He found he was screaming; the rage and indignation he'd been so carefully containing boiling up in his throat and exploding out in words. "How many times must I tell you before my words finally sink through that thick skull of yours? I do not know!"

"They are your allies!" Thor roared back, teeth bared. 

The humans edged away, cringing at the volume of their collective rage.

"No! The moment you and your interfering playmates closed that portal, I lost their allegiance! I promised them the Tesseract, I promised them Midgard and I _failed_ and now they will slaughter you and I and every last one of your precious humans in retribution! They will-" 

The world tilted precariously under his feet. His outburst, he realized distantly, had cost him the last of his strength. Throwing out a hand he caught himself on the table’s edge as his legs gave out under him.

"Brother?" Now slumped against the table he heard, rather than saw , Thor approach; the dim creak of leather and armor plates underscoring a voice that had become suddenly unsure. He knew that tone too. Thor was finally coming back to what little senses he possessed. 

Not turning he threw up a hand. "Don't," he gasped through numb lips. He could feel the ice once again taking hold, unbidden this time, threatening to stain his flesh that hated blue. Behind him, Thor halted. _Fond of your fingers after all?_ Loki mused bitterly. "You dealt the Chitauri a grievous blow-" It was so very hot in the room. Had it been so warm when he’d entered? The air was thick, _smothering_. Shaking his hazy head, forced himself to continue. "-but their numbers are many and their leader possesses weapons beyond your comprehension. He will come, for us, for the Earth and if we do not stand together, he will win."

"And how am I to know I can trust you?"

"Oh _Norns,_ enough!" Loki snapped weakly. "Leave me! I can take no more of you!"

"Broth-

"I said _leave!"_

_"Come on,"_ someone urged gently- Banner, Loki thought. It was the first time he'd spoke since entering the room. "I'll take a look at that hand for you." There was a silent pause; he didn’t have to turn his gaze to them to know that Thor was hesitating, staring at his back like a rejected child. The mawkish dolt. 

And then feet shuffled out the doorway; one pair, two...

"Are you deaf, Stark?" he asked after a moment had passed and the second human still hadn't shifted from his spot.

"It's my building, Rock of Ages," Stark laughed flatly, "how about _you_ leave."

* * *

 

"Still not clear on why the hell you're here in the first place," Tony added as the door clicked shut behind Thor and Bruce's retreating backs, leaving him alone with the younger god.

But apparently he’d been dismissed. Loki, back still turned to him, didn’t reply.

_Like hell I have,_ Tony thought. Keeping one eye cautiously trained on the god, he grabbed the edge of the nearest overturned workbench and yanked it upright; slammed it back down hard, so that the clang of the metal legs hitting the floor echoed through the room like a thunder clap.

Jerking in surprise, Loki whirled around, eyes disoriented and comically large in his pale face. "Do _not_ do that again," he growled, gaze narrowing to slits as his gaze came to rest on Tony. 

Arching a sardonic brow, Tony propped a forearm on the workbench. _"Don't ignore me."_  

There was nothing more dangerous and unpredictable than an injured animal, particularly a cornered one. Tony was acutely aware of that fact. Still, he couldn’t resist testing the razor edge of challenge. "Why _are_ you here?"

"It seemed preferable to your entryway.”  

"Not the damn workroom. I mean, _why me?_ You wreck my building, _you throw me out a window_ and now you expect my help?"

"Out of your company," Loki sneered, “you struck me as the least imbecilic. I am beginning to question that judgment." Despite the venom of his words, he sounded more tired than angry. Looked it too. With a grunt of exertion he shoved away from the table, whole body quaking with the effort of remaining upright. 

"If not jumping at the chance to team up with you is your idea of stupid, you may have your definitions reversed," Tony said, voice steady in spite of his racing pulse. He realized he'd unconsciously shifted to the balls of his feet, ready for flight. The god looked in no shape to attack, if anything he looked ready to drop, but that logic was doing little to sooth the memory of Loki’s fingers closing around his throat.

"We will see." Still balancing himself on the table Loki took a tentative step towards the nearby wall.

"You, _here,_ " Tony spat, _"not cool."_

Loki didn’t reply. He was staring at the wall, brows knit in a mix of expressions Tony couldn’t begin to unravel. Considering? _Wary?_ And then he was releasing his hold on the table, one finger at a time, like a little kid psyching himself up to let go of the pool ladder. _Ring finger, pinky_ and then he was free. Hand still hovering above the table’s surface, he tried to take a step, but he was unsteady as a colt that hadn't learned to work its legs. Knees buckling he hit the wall with an audible thud. 

It took Tony a second to realize he hadn’t just fallen. He’d passed out. 

Armour scraping against the cement with a sickening screech, he slid to the floor, came to rest propped up against the wall, limbs disjointed, head lolling. 

"If my readings are accurate, the intruder is unconscious," the omnipresent voice of JARVIS announced. "My data on Asgardian physiology is limited though."

"I’m inclined to agree,” Tony drawled, rubbing his arms with clammy palms. “Now can we stop calling him _'The Intruder'?_ I'm starting to feel like a cheesy Bond villain." Christ it was cold all of the sudden. _Freezing,_ as matter of fact. Goosebumps were rising on his forearms. “ _The hell?_ JARVIS?" The words ghosted out from his lips in a puff of white

"I'm registering a severe drop in temperature," JARVIS said in answer to the unspoken question. "It's limited to the workroom. I think it safe to assume that this is the younger Odinson's doing."

"What is he, Father Christmas?" Tony spat, teeth chattering. Tucking both hands under his arms to thaw his fingers, he stepped out from behind the work bench for a better view. Loki was still; lying in a crumpled mess of limbs on the floor, the infrequent twitch of his eyelids the only betraying sign of life.

"I do hope that is a rhetorical question, Sir."

_"Counteract it."_

"Yes, Sir." Instantly the heating system jumped into action, torrid air pouring from the overhead vents and ruffling Tony's hair. Positioning himself under the nearest, Tony exhaled in a mixture of relief and annoyance.  

“Should I contact a physician Sir?”

Tony hadn’t considered it up until that point. The question took him by surprise.The guy had spread an unholy amount of blood across his floors, more than could be healthy, even for a so-called god, but offering him help hadn’t crossed Tony’s mind. Not for an instant.

_Is that because I’m expecting him to bounce back from this or hoping he won’t?_ Tony wondered. 

Showing kindness to his enemy, that would _of course_ be the noble thing to do, the sort of thing that someone like Steve would probably do. But then as Captain Rogers had gone to pains to point out, Tony mused, _he_ was not noble.

_“Sir?”_

_Say ‘yes’ Stark, take the high road._ But he couldn’t make his mouth form the word. There was a wall blocking his way down that path. A wall stained with a genuinely noble man's blood and Tony realized he didn’t have a chance in hell of scaling it. 

Releasing the fists his finger had curled themselves into, he turned away. "Just watch him JARVIS," he said, crossing to the workroom's entrance, "If he tries anything out of line, if he so much as blinks wrong, he's getting taken down."

"Understood, Sir."

Sparing the god one last glance over his shoulder, he slammed out the door.

 


	5. Chapter Five

“I need to know how Loki is teleporting and how to block it,” Tony said to JARVIS as he exited the workroom. “Start gathering whatever energy readings you can.”

“I’ve already have,” JARVIS replied. “So far I’ve discovered nothing of note.”

“Well keep looking.” The ding of the elevator echoed down the hall as he spoke.

He glanced up in time to see a frazzled looking Bruce emerge from the lift, hands sunk deep into the pockets of his baggy slacks. Spotting Tony he pursed his lips in a soundless whistle.

“How’s Thor?”

“Pissed. And sporting a case of what looks remarkably like frostbite, but I think I’ve got him half way calmed down. Loki?”

“Alive, despite all logic to the contrary.”

"They're certainly the Timex of bipeds."

Despite his foul mood Tony couldn’t keep a grin from spilling onto his face.

“You left him in the workroom?”

“Oh, he’s out like a light. Took a swan dive into the wall.”

Bruce winced. “Should we-”

“And get our necks wrung for our troubles?” Tony scoffed. “Anyway, you turned him into a fair imitation of Foie Gras and he bounced back from that like a goddamn daisy.”

“Hmm,” Bruce hummed, weighing that. “So what exactly are we going to do with junior then?” He glanced pointedly over Tony’s shoulder at the workroom door.

Tony’s grin faltered. The question had been on his mind from moment he’d seen Loki vanish from the lobby. How did you contain someone who could teleport through ten inches of reenforced concrete without breaking a sweat? First you have to figure out how the hell he does, and that was looking like it might take a while.

“Considering he can just...” Tony said, fluttering his fingers, _“do whatever that was?_ I don’t know.”

“That whole time on the carrier,” Bruce said. “All those agents-”

“Yeah,” Tony said, cutting him off. He couldn’t take hearing the rest said aloud.

Loki’s disappearing trick had cast a whole new light on the events of that day. All the people that had lost their lives; _Coulson_ and for what? What had the point of any of it been? _Loki proving he was cleverer than the rest of them?_ Tony didn’t think he could examine that line of thought too closely and manage to still remain sane. Wouldn’t be able to fight his yearning to walk back through the workroom door and finish the job someone else had started.

Maybe Bruce was thinking the same. Maybe he was genuinely fascinated with floor tiles he’d suddenly taken to examining. Either way, both of them were abruptly out of anything to say; the seconds ticked by.

In the end, it was Bruce that broke the silence. “You should get some air,” he said. Shoulders taking on a determined set, he looked up, meeting Tony’s gaze. “I’ll keep an eye on Loki.”

Something in the statement caught Tony on the raw. “What?” he asked sharply, “you think I can’t handle myself?”

Bruce stared at him. “I don’t think you should have to,” he replied evenly. “It’s not personal for me. Not the way it is for you.”

“It’s not-” Tony fell silent, throat working, but not getting the words out. It was personal. He’d pointed out just that to Steve. That was Loki’s game; _divide and conquer, instigate chaos._ And here he was playing along, letting anger and frustration get the better of him again. He’d been irrationally furious enough times before to recognize the symptoms. _Racing pulse?_ Check. _Perspiring?_ Check. _Trying to bite off the heads of people who are only trying to help? Double check._ Time to get a lid on things before he gave into the urge to break something, _like Loki’s smug face._

“Thanks,” he said finally, a little sheepish. “I just need a minute. _If he tries anything-”_

“The ‘talking house’ will let you know,” Bruce said with a tired chuckle. “Take your time.”

Tony just nodded and moved passed him; determined to make it through the elevator doors before he could change his mind.

 _You should get some air,_ Bruce had said and that was exactly what Tony intended to do.

Instead he ended up hunched over the bar of his destroyed lounge with a tall glass of scotch in one hand. Well, he thought sourly, he was getting some fresh air. A faint breeze rustled though the heavy plastic that had been stretched across the gaping hole in his wall.

At his elbow one of tablets displayed feeds from his workroom cameras. JARVIS had focused each and every one of them Loki’s inert form; _three hundred and sixty-five degrees of the hatchet-faced bastard._ It looked like he hadn’t moved a muscle since Tony’d exited stage left.

Yep, a few minutes of distance; that’s all he needed. Then he would go back down there and relieve Bruce of his babysitting duties. _Just a few minutes..._

He was already so far under by the time his head hit the bar that the sensation of his forehead plowing into the granite top barely registered.

 

* * *

 

 

In Tony’s dreams Pepper was screaming. He darted up the emergency stairs two at time, heart slamming against his ribcage like it was trying to break free, all the while knowing he wouldn’t make it time. Desperate to try all the same.

Above, the hatch to the roof was open, flooding the stairwell in flashes of light; explosions- the whole building was shuddering under their concussive force, threatening to shake apart under Tony’s feet. And still he could hear her voice, clear above the din; calling for him, begging.

“Pepper!” After what seemed like an eternity he burst onto the roof, his eyes, roving, searching desperately for her. Around him the city was burning, flames shooting from a thousand windows. Skyscrapers crumbed and toppled into one another other like dominoes as people screamed on the streets below. The smoke rose up, washed over him, stinging his eyes and filling his nostrils with the acrid stench of burning flesh.

“Pepp-” he tried, but he choked on her name, breath catching in his throat and he doubled over, gagging on the relentless smoke. That was when he saw her. A small, unmoving shape in the gravel, tawny hair pooling abound her head like spilt blood.

“No,” he gasped, falling to his knees, hands clutching his burning throat, “Pep-”

“You’re late, Stark.” A dark figure resolved itself from the haze: a pair of curved horns, two green eyes that burned with internal light. “A shame really, that she didn’t last a little longer,” Loki crooned, cheshire cat grin splitting his face in two. “She screamed so very prettily for you.”

 

Tony started awake with a gasp, Loki’s mocking voice ringing in ears.

The rosy light of dawn was pouring in through the plastic sheeting and glinting off his overturned glass, crystal casting dancing prisms across the bar, a rainbow of shifting colors. The peace was so absolute, that for moment, Tony thought it had all been a dream. _Loki, Thor._ Then the pounding in his head came rushing in and the smell of stale alcohol wafting from the bar and Tony realized that only _part_ of it had been a nightmare. The rest, nightmarish as it was, had been horrifyingly real.

Loki, back on earth, in _his_ basement.

A sudden thought occurred to him, a name rising from the muddled sea of his thoughts: Bruce. Shit, shit, _shit._ He jerked up in the chair and groped for his tablet, every other thought fleeing his brain. _He’d left Bruce alone with Loki._

The screen of his tablet was dark. Something viscous had pooled and dried on its surface. His drink. He’d dumped a glass full of scotch on his tablet and fried the thing. Snatching it from the bar he gave it futile shake before tossing it back down with a curse.

“JARVIS?”

“Sir?” JARVIS answered instantly.

“Bruce, is he-”

“Doctor Banner is still guarding the younger Odinson and is perfectly well. Loki has barely moved since your departure. Thor is resting in one of the guest rooms. Everything is under control, Sir.” There was a smug edge to the A.I.’s words.

“One of these days I’m going to wipe the personality right off your programming,” Tony said. All false venom. He was too relieved to be properly annoyed. Blinking against the sunlight, he scrubbed a palm across his eyes as his pulse was decelerated back to a normal speed: the brief adrenaline rush draining away and leaving him sore and foggy headed in its wake.

“Perhaps a shower would improve Sir’s mood,” JARVIS’s offered, sounding decidedly unimpressed by the threat. “Dried scotch does not make for the best of styling gels.”

Groaning Tony shoved off the bar stool, every joint in his body screeching in protest. His head hurt, his muscles ached, his teeth felt like they were wearing wool sweaters.

 _Coffee,_ he needed coffee and about three hundred Advil.

Muttering obscenities under his breath, he trudged toward the elevator.

 

Bruce had started setting the workroom to rights in Tony’s absence. The majority of the work benches were still overturned, but the desk and computer were back in order. He’d also salvaged Tony’s well used napping couch from the wreckage and dragged it over to the door. That’s where Tony found him, glasses perched on his nose, face half hidden behind a magazine.

“Ew,” Tony said by way of greeting, eyeing Loki, who, true to JARVIS’ word, was just were Tony had left him, “is it dead?”

“All signs point to maybe,” Bruce replied, blandly and turned a page. “I’m not going to be the one to poke him and find out though.” His eyes were red rimmed behind the thick lenses.

“That makes two of us then.” He was still studying Loki’s huddled form. Despite his quip, the god was most definitely _not_ dead- his skin was ashen, but his shoulders rose and fell in a steady cadence beneath the heavy armour. “Sorry about leaving you alone with the sleeping dragon all night.”

Bruce shrugged, nonplussed. “I’ve caught up on two years of the Journal of Thermophysics and Heat Transfer.”

“You crazed party animal.” Perplexed, he squinted at the stack of magazines beside Bruce’s leg. His brain was still chugging along in first gear, head pounding like a soccer team was holding a match on his frontal lobes. _Focus._ “Where did those even come from?”

“Your reference library.”

“I have a reference library?”

Bruce let out a snort. “I’m not dignifying that with a reply.”

Tony’s brain was wandering. “Maybe if we had one of those long poles,” he mused.

“Hmm?”

“For Loki I mean. You know, like the kind they use to catch stray cats.”

Bruce lowered the magazine, eyebrows attempting to climb into his hairline.

“I caught the flu when I was in Houston a couple years back,” Tony explained, defensively. “Spent three days in my hotel room puking my guts out and watching Animal Planet.”

“You need sleep.”

“The last time I was up this early, I was still at a party. _I need coffee._ Do you need coffee?”

“Coffee makes me... _jittery,”_ Bruce admitted. He was clearly fighting a laugh.

For once, Tony was failing to see anything particularly funny about the current state of affairs. “If you feel anything like you look,” he pointed out, “I doubt an eight-ball of coke could make you jittery.”

“You could be right.” Setting aside the magazine Bruce pushed to his feet, a chorus of pops sounding from his back in response. Tony own spine sympathized. “What about him?”

Their gazes tracked in unison back to Loki.

“He look like he’s going anywhere anytime soon to you?” Tony asked.

“He did surface for a little while not long after you left,” Bruce said, muffling a yawn against his hand. “Didn’t say anything, just scrunched himself up into ball and passed back out.”

“Uh huh. _Coffee,”_ Tony, intoned clapping him on the arm. “Before we both start doing reenactments of that.” Instructing JARVIS to move the Mark VII upstairs and lock down the workroom, Tony steered the other man towards the door.

 

It took Tony ten minutes of banging around the first floor kitchen to find coffee grounds. This was the tower’s industrial kitchen, a room of wall to wall stainless steel countertops, commercial appliances and walk in refrigerators. Everything a team of chefs would need to service the two-hundred seat dinning hall. Tony had only been in the room twice since its completion. He wasn’t entirely sure it had even been stocked until he started pulling open cupboards and discovering dry goods. Eventually though, a search of the pantry revealed a giant box dubiously marked ‘breakfast blend’. If he hadn’t been so dehydrated, he would have wept with joy.

It was smooth sailing after that; Tony had spotted the giant espresso maker during his Quest for the Holy Grounds and that was something he knew he could work while blind and half comatose- _some of his hangovers had come near the mark._

“You really think it’s safe leaving him down there alone for this long?” Bruce had taken up a perch on a stool at the prep table while Tony searched, a pair of Tony’s tablets in front of him- _surveillance videos from the work room on one,_ the energy readings JARVIS had been gathering on the other.

“The only way he’s getting out of there is to pull the old teleporting routine again, which we still have no idea how to put the kibosh on, _so-_ ”

“There’s a reassuring thought.” Eyes going back to the pads, Bruce tapped one of the screens thoughtfully. “Jumping between two physical points like that... he must have an energy source of some type that he’s tapping into.”

“I don’t know.” Tony was thwacking the espresso maker’s small filter basket against the counter to level the grounds. “Thor’s comment makes me think otherwise. Assuming he’s got the slightest idea what he’s talking about.”

“Of what do you speak?”

Tony’s heart did a stutter step of alarm. Thor was standing in the kitchen doorway, a study in morning-after dishevelment. Still in full armour, his face was ruddy and his blond hair was tangled into a halo of unseemly mats. “My apologies,” he said, taking in Tony’s wide eyes and the coffee grounds littering the tile like a layer of brown snow. “I did not mean to startle you.”

At the table Bruce was staring off into space, left eye twitching in agitation. Tony could practically see him mentally counting back from ten. “We’re all a little _on edge,”_ he said, side eyeing the scientist meaningfully.

“Ah,” Thor said uneasily, following his gaze. “Indeed. Again, my apologies.”

Bruce muttered something unintelligible through his teeth.

“My brother still sleeps?” Thor had caught sight of the tablet in front of Bruce. Pale brows bunching together in a frown, he leaned over the table for a better look, caution forgotten as quickly as it had appeared.

“Yams,” Bruce said with sudden determination. Or maybe it was _‘hams’,_ Tony was still having a hard time concentrating. He went determinedly back to tamping coffee grounds. _If he was going to die by crushing, he was at least going out caffeinated._ Twisting the filter basket into place, he flipped the brew switch and watched liquid nirvana pour into his waiting cup. Good color, _good creme._ Snagging the cup from the drip tray, he tossed back the espresso shot, heedless of its scalding temperature. _Ah yes,_ nothing like a tincture of good old black crude to sooth wounded nerves. Feeling steadier already he set about making a second round and saw, from the corner of his eye, that Thor was still studying the video feed. “How long have we got before he’s recovered enough to go poof again?” he asked, dumping in enough grounds for a double.

Thor turned to face him. “What?”

“Take off, escape, _make a run for it.”_

“I understand your meaning Stark,” Thor said, crossing his massive arms, “but not your logic. Loki chose to come here, why should he want to run?”

 _Oh for the love of God,_ Tony thought, pressing the ‘on’ switch again. “You said it yourself. He and the Chitauri are planning something and whatever it is, I’m guessing it’s going to go a lot smoother for him, if he isn’t locked up.”

Thor’s frown deepened. “You miss-took my words. The Chitauri no doubt have some plot, but I do not believe my brother part of it, simply privy to it.”

Tony opened his mouth to respond. Closed it.

“You _believe_ him?” Bruce said for him.

“We’ve seen this trick before,” Tony pointed out. “Using himself as bait to lure us all to one spot-”

“The better to blow us up,” Bruce grumbled.

Thor’s gaze was bouncing between them like a spectator at Wimbledon. “It was Loki the Chitauri came for,” he said, “and they did not come to free him.”

Sighing, Tony rolled his eyes. This, apparently, was the wrong move to make. Nostrils flaring in anger, Thor unfolded his arms only to slam a fist down on the table with a force that rattled the cupboards.

Cursing, Bruce jerked back in surprise, nearly falling from the stool. “Will you _please_ stop doing-” he began, righting himself, but Thor was already speaking over him, drowning out his smaller voice-

“You think me foolish,” the god rumbled, glancing between them, eyes wide and furious. “I am well aware of this. But mark my words, I was waging war long before your father’s fathers begot them.”

Tony blinked in disbelief. _Had Thor seriously just age carded them?_

“I know what I saw,” Thor went on. Straightening to his full and not inconsiderable height he leveled an accusing finger on Tony. “The Chitauri came to _kill._ It was no bluff.”

A hot stream of liquid pouring across his hand reminded Tony that the espresso maker was still running. _“Shit.”_ He smacked the power button. “Okay, _granddad,”_ he said with far more composure than he felt as he flicked watered down java from his fingers, “let’s say baby bro is telling the truth. Where’s that leave us?”

“They went to great trouble to ambush us and we were pursued long after they had taken the Tesseract,” Thor said, looking at least slightly mollified. “They will likely come for him again.”

“It makes no sense,” Bruce argued. “They have their super weapon, they’re probably thinking they can wipe us all off the map without batting an eyelash.”

 _“-figuratively speaking,”_ Tony couldn’t resist adding riley.

Bruce shook his head in dismay. “Point is,” he went on, “why bother chasing down Loki for revenge first?”

_“Good point.”_

“Why attack the earth at all?” Thor shot back, “Why do any of this? They do not seem a race prone to _reason.”_

 _Equally good point that,_ Tony thought, but he kept it to himself. _Acquisition of resources? Land? A-_ he had to repress a shudder... _a food source?_

“You say they ambushed you and took the Tesseract,” Bruce said. “So how did you get back to earth?”

“I’m a not sure as to the exact details.” To Tony’s surprise Thor visibly reddened. “I was... unconscious for much of it.”

“About that,” Tony interjected.

Thor was rapidly turning crimson. “Ah, well...” he cleared throat, “My brother’s shackles had a binding on them-

_“Magic?”_

“Magic, yes. My father’s. When the Chitauri attacked, we were greatly outnumbered. I knew I must free him if we were to have any hope of winning. But the only way I could...” another nervous cough covering a garbled word.

“Say _what_ now?” Tony inquired.

“Mjolnir,” Thor muttered.

“Your _hammer?”_ Tony was incredulous.

“Its strike broke the shackles,” Thor blurted out, speaking so quickly that the words blended together, “but the force of the two magics meeting...” again he faltered.

 _Not funny._ Tony told himself. _No, not funny. We’re facing a damn alien apocalypse, don’t you dare laugh. Be mature about this._ Behind Thor, Bruce was silently rocking against the table, teeth biting down on the pad of a thumb. _That’s how frazzled and out of our minds we both are, Tony thought. We’re standing around laughing at nothing, while the world threatens to come down around our ears._ Were they both going crazy?

“So,” he managed to squeak, breathing hard through his nose, “you knocked yourself out?”

“Yes.” Thor’s voice was flat, his nostrils once again flaring in that ominous fashion Tony was beginning to recognize as the signal for a blowup.

“So you don’t know how you got back?” asked Bruce.

 _“As I said,”_ Thor replied icily, “I did not witness the journey itself. Doubtless though, my brother used his magic to cross the realms. He has done it before.”

Tony found himself staring in... what? He was starting to have trouble cataloging the sensations. _Shock? Disbelief? Resigned apathy?_ “Hold on,” he insisted, _“rewind._ He can jump between _worlds?_ Whole goddamn planets?”

“More like ‘goddamn’ universes,” Bruce drawled. “Last time I checked, the Chitauri weren’t from this side of the tracks.”

“Yes.” Thor said again simply. _Unhappily._ “He can.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not much for action this time around! Mostly just Tony and Bruce trying to get their bearings, but 20 points to whoever gets the yam joke. xD
> 
> Forewarning for the next chapter- things are going to get a bit gory! -I used that 'mature' rating for a reason! ;)


	6. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have to apologize for how long this update took! December and January were incredibly busy for me and I've only recently had a chance to start writing again. Thanks for being so patient, everyone!

The waking world returned in stages, like a slow, inexorable crawl over broken glass. At first Loki’s mind shunned it, tried to force it back, some still half dormant part of him knowing what awaited. Better to stay in kind, cool darkness, free from thought and feeling and memory, it insisted. But reality would not be denied, it crept up on him as a bead of sweat tracing a trail from his brow, down across his cracked lips; as the burning, inescapable heat. And little by little, reason won out. He could not remember why or how it had come to be, but he was wounded and not healing as he should. He had to wake, to act, or he would fall back into a sleep there would be no returning from.

That thought ringing in his mind, he scratched his way to the surface, latching on to each new sensation that arose, clinging to them like a drowning man drawing on a lifeline. Inevitably the pain came too, hot and sharp and unrelenting, but he welcomed it like the rest. Pain was preferable to numb oblivion and this hurt was nothing compared to those the Chitauri had dealt him. He embraced it, let it wash over him. _Just a little further._

Soon, sound invaded the boundaries of the narrow world that was forming around him, a dim impression of noise that rapidly solidified into voices. Stark, _and his creation-_ the computer that inhabited both the tower and the human’s confounded armor. A sudden flood of shadowy images assaulted him; darkness, confusion, an ambush he’d known full well was coming. Fighting, falling to earth, escaping, _the Chitauri nipping at their heels . . ._

That realization was his final, rude jerk into wakefulness. His eyes snapped open to the sight of gray walls and glossy floors that were still scattered with the wreckage his scuffle with Thor had created. He had taken little notice of the room then, too preoccupied with staying out of Thor’s grasp. Now he studied all that lay in the path of his gaze, noting what he could of the layout. Bare walls of concrete, sparsely decorated, rose to a high ceiling of the same material. Gray above, gray below, gray in the spaces between. In some abstracted way, it recalled the ruined halls of Jotunheim to his tired mind, though those had been blue upon blue and drowned in darkness, not illuminated by the harsh, artificial lights the humans favored. He scanned the detritus scattered about him too, containing his examination to what he could see without raising his head to look about, not yet ready to draw Stark’s attention. Scraps of metal met his searching eyes and tools, the majority of which he’d either forgotten the names for, or never learned. A dawning suspicion began to form in his mind as he looked. _Surely he had not . . ._ but he had, he realized, gaze suddenly riveting on a piece of debris that rested not three arms length from where he sat. It was still bare metal, not the accustomed fiery red, but there was no mistaking the contours of that familiar faceplate. In his rush to escape Thor, he'd landed himself in middle of Stark’s workroom. _A merry trap indeed!_ He had blindly aimed for the building’s lowest point. It had never occurred to him that- _and yet it should have._ The subterranean levels were the logical place to locate what was, in essence, the human’s armory. 

“Sir, the younger Odison’s heart rate is rising. I believe he’s awake.” 

Loki couldn’t contain a flinch of surprise. _Norns damn that computer._

He’d know he could not maintain the illusion of sleep forever, he needed to tend his injuries and soon. The more aware he became of his body, the more it became apparent that something was amiss. The wound to his back, (the work of a chitauri spear) was, inexplicably, not mending. But he did not need Stark watching him fumble about. He was not prepared show weakness, as beneficial as doing so might prove. Humans had an uncanny soft spot for sick, broken things. He _could_ play to that weakness, play the enfeebled victim who needed tending and throw himself at the humans’ mercy. It might well soften their suspicion. But pride would not afford him that strategy so close on the heels of defeat. 

Both man and computer had fallen silent now, waiting. _A game then._ They knew him to be awake. They knew also, that he was aware of their presence. _Who would have the courage to break the silence first?_ For a moment he allowed his eyes to slip shut, girding his mind in a protective layer of resolve and then opening them once more, he grit his teeth and forced himself up. Instantly his vision swam and his legs threatened to reunite him with the floor. He had to put a hand out to brace himself and wait for the dizziness to subside. A few seconds spent concentrating, focus narrowed to drawing the muggy air into his lungs and it did. His muscles ached from too long spent in an unnatural position and his shoulder throbbed in time with his heart, but the world steadied. 

“Welcome back, Sleeping Beauty,” Stark drawled, with his perpetual sarcastic edge. 

_He wasn't quite so unruffled last night,_ Loki thought, a smile curling his mouth. There had been moments upstairs when the man’s voice had risen to tones worthy of an agitated young maiden. Though at the time, Stark’s mind had likely been too addled by drink for him to know it. Smoothing his expression, Loki turned to face him. Standing behind a desk at the center of the room, arms folded before him, Stark stared back, unblinking. Their was uncertainty in the narrowed eyes, wariness and something else, something as of yet indiscernible that lurked just below the surface, but he was not, Loki thought, intoxicated now. His eyes were red and tired, but they were free of the alcohol’s glaze. Whether that would prove to his advantage or not, he wasn’t sure. 

“Have a nice nap?” Stark’s asked. Ah yes, now Loki knew what that hidden emotion was, Stark’s tone made it clear. _Challenge._ Foolish child.

“What time has passed?” he asked, ignoring the provocation.

“Twenty-four hours, give or take.”

“A day?” _He had lost more time than he’d guessed._

Stark still didn’t blink. “That’s right,” he said, tone baiting as before. 

He felt steadier now. Cautiously, he lowered his hand from the wall. _A new thought occurred to him._ “And have any of the Chitauri shown themselves?” he asked, willing his heart to keep steady in anticipation of the answer. He’d be damned if he was going to have the computer reporting on his every change in mood. 

“No,” Stark shot back, pleased, as though this proved something, “Not a one.” 

No mistaking so thinly veiled an implication. Loki crooked an eyebrow in reply, affecting the perplexed look he’d often seen Thor wear. _Let Stark lash out and postulate._ Under the veneer of confidence he’d armed himself with, a doubt had been kindled that no amount of needling words could deny. Actions after all, were always the true measure of a man’s convictions and no man who was certain of the things Stark was pretending to be, would have allowed an enemy to remain so long within his walls. _No,_ Loki mused, _he would have found himself waking in another of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s preposterous holding cells, not on Stark’s unkind floor, were Stark certain he was lying._

Unimpressed and unconvinced in equal measure, Stark flashed him a mocking copy of his expression. _“Well?”_ the man prompted, forehead furrowed in lines of exaggerated concern. His finger tapped out an impatient beat on the crook of his arm. 

_Yes, Loki thought, _he liked him better drunk._ Time for a diversion then. “I don’t suppose,” he inquired neutrally, “that you have a bath somewhere in this monstrosity of a building?” _

This had the desired result. Temporarily disarmed and at a loss for a snappy reply, Stark blinked at him in surprise. “A ba-” he attempted, baffled and Loki found it hard to keep a grin from twisting his lips. Stark recovered quickly though. For a second he continued to flounder, mouth working, but making no reply, fingers flexing in angry spasms upon the material of his shirt, but then he mastered himself. “Through the door,” he said stiffly, face falling back into hard suspicion. Jabbing a thumb over his shoulder, he added, as though it pained him greatly to admit it, “There’s a shower.”

Loki’s own expression didn’t waver. “That will do.”

A noise that was either a laugh, or the sound of Stark choking on his own tongue, boomed through the cavernous space in a manic echo. “We aim to please.”

A response danced on the tip of Loki’s tongue, begging for release, but like the smile, he swallowed it down with an ease born from centuries of practice. He didn’t have time to waste on churlish banter with Stark. He’d strayed from his errand too long as it was. With every minute he stood, the pain in his back increased and his strength waned. Breaking his gaze from Stark’s before the man could think of something more to say, or renege on his grudging offer, Loki started towards the indicated door. 

Crossing the small space was a greater feat than he could have imagined. His legs shook, his vision, already edged in darkness, narrowed with each step. Still his shoulders remained squared, his head held high. He had, in his day, run many human leagues without effort, he would not be defeated by crossing a room. Within a few brief, torturous seconds he was at the wall and before the strange metal door, which like those he’d encountered on the tower’s upper floors, had no handle, but slid noiselessly aside at a touch of the hand. 

“There’s a control pad in the stall,” Stark called, genuine amusement in his voice now. “You have to-”

 _“Yes, Stark.”_ Briefly, Loki paused, hand still raised, fingers touching empty air where the door had been. He could not speak and keep a note of scorn from slipping through: _“I know how to use a shower.”_

Not glancing back, he passed through into the room beyond and the door slid shut behind him, blocking out Stark’s laughing silence. With the flimsy barrier of metal hiding him from the man's gaze, he allowed himself a moment to catch his breath. _Only_ a moment. If he stopped, he would not easily rally a second time and he would need every ounce of energy he could muster for what he was about to do. Stepping into the center of the small room, he whispered a spell in his mind. It was a small act of magic, an incantation so familiar to him that it was barely a conscious thought and instantly a throwing knife lay in his left hand. A small magic, but even it taxed his reserves. It would have been easier, _far_ easier to form a blade of ice, as he had seen many of the Jotun do; but he feared drawing on that power again. During the brief exchange with Stark, staring at the human’s cool, dry face, it had occurred to him why he felt trapped in a burning dessert, while Stark remained hot only in temper. The Jotun blood was stirring in his veins, fighting for release. It had been a mistake to release Odin’s blasted spell and free it when he had, he saw that now. Weak as he was, he could not properly seal it away again. If the spell that kept him Aesir, failed, slipped completely- _No. He would not think of that._ Even imagining it made him dizzy with the force of his repulsion. 

Instead he turned his attentions to the knife clutched in his white knuckled hand. Its keen edge glinted in the overhead lights, ready to be buried in some unsuspecting fool’s throat. But today it would taste leather, not the warm, living flesh it was accustomed to. Moving on instinct, not allowing himself to think, he slipped the blade under the strap that held his shoulder guard secure and sliced it cleanly in two. There was no time to undo the many laces and buckles that held his armour together, even if his fingers had not been too numb for the task. Casting the shoulder guard to the floor, he shrugged free of the long coat and set to work on the next layer. It was slow going, his right hand of little use and the shoulder too stiff and sore to allow much movement, but eventually one layer and then another fell to the cold tile, until he was down to nothing but his trousers and undershirt. The shirt gave him pause. The wisest choice would be to cut it off; it was badly torn in back. Still, a torn shirt was better than none and though he was not particularly burdened by modesty, going around in naught but his skin would be an indignity. One he’d be reduced to, if he set blade to much more of his clothing in his need for haste. Dropping the knife atop the piled armour, he took hold of the shirt’s hem and gingerly drew it up. Careful as he was, working his good arm free first, so that he could pull it over his head without moving the other, it was an unpleasant business. Parts of the fabric had dried to the wound and would not come free easily and he was breathing through grit teeth and shaking with exertion by the end of it. With an unsteady hand, he tossed the shirt aside. His last few garments were easy dealt with by comparison and boots and trousers shortly joined the rest. 

_Time for the truly unpleasant part._ Pushing the unhelpful thought aside he stepped over the pile of clothing and pulled open the shower door before anticipation could make him falter. True to his words, he could work something so simple as a shower, though those he’d encountered before had been far more primitive. Still, a little intuition was all that was needed and that was a quality he was well possessed of. A few taps on the touchscreen controls and icy water was pouring down on his head. At least he supposed it was icy, he’d turned the temperature as far down as it would go. To his skin, the water felt tepid; further confirmation of his suspicions. All the same, it was a welcome relief from the burning atmosphere of the room. His head felt clearer than it had in a long while as a result, better able to focus and with a clearer head, came harder resolve. Gritting his teeth, he twisted his good arm behind his back. An awkward angle, but he found that he could indeed reach the problem wound. 

He could only fathom one answer for why it remained open while the others healed; something foreign was lodged in either flesh or bone that was impeding the process. The fight was still hazy in his mind, it had happened quickly and in utter darkness, so he could not say for certain, but the tip of a spear seemed a likely bet. 

For a moment his fingers hovered, body fighting what his brain was urging them to do. _Don’t think. Pain is nothing. Accept it, overcome it._ He chanted the words in his mind. 

_One finger,_ then a second. Pain stole the breath from his lungs and brought hot tears to his eyes, but he did not pull away. Slowly, with shaking fingers he probed the ruined flesh, searching. Soon blood was running freely down his back and the path of his arm to be whisked away by the water and disappear down the drain. His head grew hazy again, his fingers numbed. Still he persisted, feeling along the point where the rib was broken. Something sharp and hard met his touch. _A shard of bone, or the shard of metal he was searching for?_ He pressed down, trying to be gentle in his exploration, but a fresh wave of pain blossomed at the touch, stronger than any that had come before. The sensation was exquisite and his stomach threatened to rebel; would have, had it anything to spill. _That’s it,_ he realized, when, a few seconds later he was once again capable of thought. Luckily the top of it was not flush with the bone. Before he could think on what he was doing, he grasped it between slippery fingers and pulled. 

Darkness. 

When he came to again, he had no inkling if seconds or hours had passed. He was on his knees, slumped against the shower wall. The water was still falling. His head felt too heavy to lift. He turned his attention to raising his arm instead and something fell from where it lay in his slack palm and clattered to the shower floor. He spared it no thought, his mind bent on a single tas; the words of an ancient incantation.

Of the few men that dabbled in sorcery, fewer still learnt the art of Seiðr. _Women’s magic,_ or so the sneering voices whispered, when the subject arose. It was the branches of the art devoted to divination, convening with the spirits of the dead, that drew their ire, but that was not its sole use. It was also a healing art and that was the magic he called on now. Soundlessly his lips moved, forming the words he recited in his mind, power formed and grew at his fingertips. He could only hope he had the strength left to sustain it. 

* * *

Standing before the mirror in the hallway of his Lower East Side apartment, officer Joseph Perry gave his regulation navy blue tie a final, leisurely tug. Satisfied, he took down his jacket from the rack, shrugged it on, before running a hand along his service belt, checking that everything was in place. His pace was unhurried, despite the fact that the kitchen clock read 3:14 in the afternoon and he was well on track to being late for his shift. Let headquarters ream him a new one. They’d damn well known when they’d drawn up the duty roster, that with the modified schedules the trains were running on, he could either be there four minutes late, or thirty early. Did they honestly expect him to stand around with his thumb up his ass for a full half hour, waiting for his shift to start? Not a chance. What with everything north of Forty-Second still a ghost town, he wasn’t spending a minute more there than he had to. Whole area still gave him the creeps. Not that he’d say it out loud. Vargas, his jackass partner was making enough jeering comments as it was. _“On your toes Joey,”_ he’d taken to intoning, every time Perry reacted to an unexpected noise, _“probably the aliens.”_

 _Aliens._ Who would have believed it? Like something straight out of Predator. He hadn’t seen one himself, not a live one anyway. He’d been underground that day, working Columbus Circle. Been too busy trying to control the stampede of fleeing civs, to ever go topside and see the action. He had seen the dead ones though, after. Hard not to. They’d been everywhere at first, scattered around like giant, stinking confetti. Then the government reinforcements had shown up in their matching suits and unmarked vans and carted the bodies away. They’d been real hush hush about it too. What a laugh. Rumour was around the watering hole, that a few entrepreneuring wackos had been out playing body snatcher before the dust so much as settled. Beyond him what anyone wanted with a dead alien though. Souvenirs? 

_“Probably for some little Chinese guy to steep in his tea!”_ Vargas had suggested to hoots of laughter in the back room of Jake’s. _Yeah,_ like Vargas’ granny back in Santa Cruz or wherever, wasn’t reading sheep entrails as they spoke. 

Pulling back his sleeve, Perry checked his watch. The next northbound train was departing in fifteen minutes. He’d take his time walking to the station, maybe grab a cup of coffee for the trip. It felt like a double espresso kind of day. He reached out to take his hat from the rack, had just closed his fingers around the brim, when the sound of the doorbell chimed through the hall. Perry frowned. He wasn’t expecting anyone. Pulling on his cap, he trudged down the short hallway, belt rattling. Better be just the mailman, or maybe FedEx, with the GNC order he’d placed a few days back and not some pack of evangelist nut jobs. There’d been a considerable influx of that sort over the past week. Swooped in like a flock of vultures, they had. One of those ‘end of the world’ cults, with enough cheesy flyers to fill a semi and not an shred of sense between them. Well, they’d get an earful if they were stupid enough to knock on his door and so would whoever'd buzzed them in. The building’s entrances were all clearly marked with ‘no soliciting’ signs and they were trespassing. 

_It was time he moved._ Somewhere downtown; a decent address, with a doorman and security. If only his job in transit didn’t pay piss-poor. Then too, maybe he could afford a car and the gas to put in it, so he wouldn’t have to take the same subway he patrolled, to get to work. 

Grasping the door handle, Perry leaned forward to check the peephole. A man stood in the dimly lit hall. Tall, tan and well built, he was dressed in an off the rack, black suit and, much to Perry’s surprise, was brandishing a badge. Perry squinted at the unfamiliar insignia of an eagle with outstretched wings, trying to make out the words. _Strategic Homeland . . . Intervention . . ._

The man pressed the doorbell a second time, without looking down. “Officer Perry, I’m Agent Mcallan of S.H.I.E.L.D. Please open up, I need to have a word with you.” He spoke with a faint Flatbush accent.

 _Well, didn’t that beat all?_ Perry thought, pulling back. Just a minute ago he’d been thinking about those suits that had shown up after the attack and now here one was, standing on _his_ doorstep. Unlatching the door’s double deadbolts Perry pulled it ajar. 

“Officer Joseph Perry, Eighteenth Precinct Transit Bureau?” the agent named Mcallan asked automatically, glancing Perry up and down.

Perry unconsciously drew himself up. “That’s right.”

“Agent McAllen, S.H.E.I.L.D.,” McAllen repeated. “May I come in?” 

Something about the agent’s gaze unnerved Perry. His eyes were an unremarkable enough shade of blue, but they were glazed, strangely unfocussed, as though the agent were recovering from an illness, or on something. “What’s this about?” Perry asked with growing trepidation. “I’m running late for work. I have to get going.” 

“Just a few routine questions. We’re speaking with all law enforcement officers who were on duty during the attack. It will only take a moment.”

Perry hesitated, one hand still holding onto the door. “If I miss my train-

“As I said, my questions will only take a moment.” Slipping his shield back into some inner pocket of his suit coat, McAllen gestured towards the hallway, indicating that Perry should precede him inside. 

Sighing, Perry let his hand slip from the door. “Come on then,” he said, and waved the agent through. Turning he moved back down the hall and McAllen wordlessly followed. The door closed with a click.

“I don’t know what I can tell you,” Perry said over his shoulder as he headed towards the lights of the kitchen. “I was working underground when it happened. Didn’t go up till-” An arm shot out behind him with lightening speed and locked around his neck, throwing him off balance. 

Perry fell back, his words breaking of in a strangled cry of alarm, but there was no time to struggle. No time even, for Joseph Perry to fully comprehend what was happening, before a hand grasped the side of his face and jerked his head back with a sudden, final _snap._

* * *

If Loki had any inkling that he was still on camera, he didn’t show it. Chin propped on his folded hands, Tony unashamedly watched him shuck the final layer of his armour and toss it to the bathroom floor. 

Despite his nonchalant posture, Tony was anything but relaxed. What little calm he’d managed to regather over the course of the morning had been dashed the instant a dagger had materialised in Loki’s hand. He’d come close to suiting up then and there and pounding the smug son of a bitch into the floor. Only seeing Loki turn the ugly little poker on his own wardrobe had stopped him. That had given him pause; enough to deliberate on the wisdom of storming in before he was positive what the god was up to. Loki had, after all, proven himself a heavy hitter, injured or not and Tony found himself weighing his anger against the chance of further, avoidable damage to his workroom. Caution had, at least temporarily, won out. So he waited and he watched, the Mark VII standing by at the ready. _And Golly gee,_ he thought, foot tapping out his agitation against the chair leg, _wouldn’t Steve be proud._

In the bathroom Loki had struggled out of his boots and gone on to his pants. He wasn’t moving easy, hadn’t been since the shirt. During the struggle to get it off he’d looked ready to scream, which soothed Tony’s nerves, _marginally._ One handed, he was now working the pants down over his gore streaked hips, wincing whenever the leather slid over a particularly dark patch of bruising. 

“Sir,” JARVIS said. Absorbed in the video feed, Tony flinched in surprise. “Thor is heading your way. Loath as I would be to accuse a guest of rashness-” 

Tony didn’t need encouraging, mouthing silent expletives, he dove for the keyboard. 

_What am I doing? Oh nothing, just being paranoid and watching your brother get naked._ Oh yes, that would go over like a box of Franzia at a WASP cocktail party. A quick keystroke and the window was gone; a page of schematics replacing the image of Loki stepping into the shower. Twisting in the chair, Tony turned to see Thor pushing open the door. “Hammer Time, you figure out the elevator?” he called.

Any further pithy comments died in his throat. Thor was staring passed him, _at the computer screen_ and Tony doubted the scowl he was sporting was the result of a secret, abiding hatred of circuit boards. _Ah. So superhuman eyesight too then._

“Don’t take it personally,” he said, in as unconcerned a tone as he could eek out, “but I don’t trust little bro to not set the place on fire.” And It was true. Down to the last word. Still, he waited in silence, on edge, as Thor left the doorway and strode slowly towards him, scarlet fabric billowing in his wake. 

But Thor made no reply. Stopping beside Tony’s chair, he planted both hands on the desk and leaned in, close enough that their shoulders were brushing. In fact, Tony could just have well been on Mars, for all the heed Thor was paying him and annoyance jumped into the mixing bowl that was his nerves. “Thor?” he prompted, craning his neck to look up at the man.

“The picture,” Thor said, eyes flicking down to him in the briefest acknowledgement, “can you bring it back?” Not angry. Not pleased by any measure, but not angry, as far as Tony could tell. 

_“Err,”_ he muttered, unsure and groped for the keyboard. It was the work of another few keystrokes to pull up the video again. 

In the lapse, Loki had gone from standing in the shower, to kneeling, his head bowed against the spray. At Tony's side, Thor huffed out a sudden, sharp exhalation at the sight and Tony looked up from the monitor to find Thor’s face contorted in a grimace. Whatever Thor’s keener eyes had made out, he was taking it in like a sucker punch to the gut. Perplexed, Tony went back to the video. He saw it then too or, thought he did. Loki had one arm bent behind his back at an odd angle, hand doing something that was obscured from the camera’s view, but a steady stream of red was trickling from the point of his elbow. 

“What,” he demanded, at once intrigued and doubly suspicious, “is he doing?” 

At first the static rush of water across the speakers was his only reply; Thor absorbed in the video and outwardly blind to anything beyond the square of shifting pixels. The silence had stretched on towards the minute mark when he finally roused from the trance. “Trying to heal himself,” he answered, in so abstracted a tone that Tony half thought he was speaking to himself. 

It hadn’t escaped Tony that the brothers were in possession of preternatural healing abilities, in addition to near invulnerability, but Thor’s statement hinted at something else. Something outside the natural process. “More magic?” His flat tone belied a private spark of interest. 

“Yes,” Thor said, elaborately.

Not quite the answer he’d been hoping for, _or the most informative._ He resisted an impatient sigh. _“How?”_ One monosyllabic response deserved another, after all.

This was met with a shake of the head from Thor. 

_’No?’_ Tony wondered. _Was that a, ‘I don’t understand the question’ no or a ‘mind your own mortal business’ no?_ Thor shook his head a second time as Tony was opening his mouth, preparatory to asking just that. 

“It is not a thing I am fit for the explaining of, Stark. The men of my kind are not schooled in such matters.”

The _“but”_ that immediately popped into Tony mouth, was interrupted by renewed signs of life from Loki, who had shifted from the crouch of moments before. 

Question temporarily forgotten, Tony watched with Thor as he tried to rise to his feet, making it halfway up before he swayed and went down on hands and knees. At the same time Tony became aware that Thor was undergoing a struggle of his own. He’d appeared uneasy from the moment Tony’d laid eyes on him at the door. Now, he was practically vibrating with tension, gripping the edge of the desk with a force that threatened to warp it; as though the thin metal top were a cliff’s edge he was holding onto for dear life. When, Loki, trying to rise a second time, again hit the floor and let out a frustrated groan, Thor seemed to lose the internal battle he’d been waging. The sound had no sooner come from Loki, than he was crossing the workroom with a look of single minded intent that left Tony fearing for the bathroom door.

Luckily, JARVIS was of the same mind and the imperilled barricade was slid open before it could be kicked through the adjoining wall. 

Tony briefly lingered in his seat behind the desk, waiting for Thor to disappear into the bathroom before he rose in pursuit; ignoring the tiny voice of reason in his head that was shouting at him to keep a safe distance. _Where,_ his subconscious inquired of that seldom regarded councillor, would the excitement be in that? If the remainder of his basement was about to be smashed to rubble, the least he deserved was a court-side view. 

Thor was crouched just outside the open shower door and favouring a freshly re-burnt hand when Tony reached the room’s threshold. Eyeing the reddened skin, Tony paused in the doorway, canting a hip against the jamb. “He _really_ digs that trick, doesn’t he?” 

“I think he has little control of it at present,” Thor replied. There was a weariness in his voice that was new. Exhaling a resigned breath through his teeth, he knelt forward on one knee and reached out a hand to Loki. The dark haired god was bent double, rigid as a figure carved out of marble. 

_“Loki?”_ Grasping him by an arm, Thor drew him away from the wall with a gentleness that took Tony by surprise. Completely at odds with the anger he’d displayed the night before, his touch was cautious, even as Loki came alive, struggling against his hold. “Easy now, little brother, easy,” he soothed and pulled the slighter body to his, heedless of the ineffectual thrashing. Loki was hissing unintelligible words of protest, eyes wide and unfocused as he tried to twist free of Thor’s grasp. Not lucid, by a long shot- _unless he was playing possum._ Tony wouldn’t have put it passed him. 

One of his wild blows finally found a mark though; an elbow to the stomach that earned a muffled grunt of pain from Thor. Locking an arm around Loki’s shoulders, Thor inclined his head to whisper against the shell of a pale ear. More meaningless reassurances, but Loki calmed a little at them, movements growing sluggish. 

“He needs rest,” Thor said, louder, shifting just enough to look back at Tony over his shoulder.

Tony was inclined to think he needed the mother lode of haldol and a padded cell, barring a much more permanent solution. Keeping that to himself seemed pertinent. “You can put him on the couch.” 

Thor bowed his head in a silent gesture of thanks that would’ve had Tony barking laughter, if the accompanying expression hand’t been so utterly grave. 

“Come,” he murmured, voice falling back into cajoling tones as he returned his attention to Loki, “you must get to your feet.” 

Loki didn’t respond. He’d gone still as they were speaking and dark lashes rested heavy against his sallow cheeks. 

“Looks down for the count.” Straightening, Tony ventured into the room. “Need a hand?” he added, feeling suddenly awkward and at loss; needing to fill the silence.

Thor already had an arm under Loki’s legs. “No,” he replied, shifting so Loki’s head rested against his shoulder. “I will manage.” Effortless as someone lifting a child, he pushed to his feet, cradling the lax body carefully in his arms and Tony stepped aside, giving him room to manoeuvre his burden through the door. 

Once Thor was out, Tony meant to follow him; was sidestepping a discarded section of Loki’s tarnished armour when a flash of something caught his eye.

Curious he circled back, picking his way through the mess. The shower was off. Likely another act of JARVIS when he’d seen Thor charging in. Stooping, Tony plucked an angry looking scrap of metal from the drain. 

“You’re to thank for all my carpet stains,” he asked aloud, turning it over in his hand. _“aren’t you?”_

It rested strangely heavy in his palm. Holding it between thumb and forefinger, he raised it to the light. _Yes,_ definitely metal and sharpened to a tantalisingly familiar, razor point at one end, but what type of metal and what it had come from, he couldn’t readily say. 

With a dismissive snort he shoved it into a pants pocket for later investigation and stalked out the door. 


	7. Chapter Seven

Friday broke clear and still, an orange dawn giving way to pale-blue, cloudless skies. In the early hours of the morning a jetstream of warm air from the South had rolled in over the eastern seaboard; unleashing an late spring heatwave on New York City. By the time Tony awoke at eight a.m. to a dry mouth and the sensation of something stabbing him in the hip, the mercury had already risen to the 90˚ degree mark. For a long while, he didn’t move; content to pour back over the past forty-eight hours as he watched hot air rise in shimmering ripples from the walkway outside his window.

The time for him to choose just whom and what to believe, was rapidly approaching. Loki wouldn’t remain out of commission much longer. Watching as Thor had settled him on the couch, still dripping wet from the shower, that point had become unpleasantly clear. The faintest of his bruises had been disappearing before Tony’s eyes, fading back to pale, unblemished skin and he had known then he had precious little time left to decide on a course of action. 

It wasn’t too late to toss Loki to S.H.I.E.L.D. Tony’d be in hot water of course; his reasons for concealing the gods’ presence so far were hardly something he could share with them, but the problem would at least pass out of his hands. But what then? If the helicarrier’s cell was the best containment system S.H.I.E.L.D. had to offer, they were no more equipped to deal with Loki than he was. And that was assuming Loki was in fact, _lying._ The story of the chitauri ambush was ludicrous, so ludicrous that it circled back around to near believability. A man who could seamlessly bluff his way into capture, without arousing any of their suspicions, as Loki had, should be able to fabricate a better story. The fact kept nagging him. That, and Thor’s vehement insistence that the attack had been genuine. Tony was starting to call into question his initial appraisal of Thor as good natured, but essentially lacking in real-estate between the ears. Tesla he wasn’t, but he was perceptive, _in his way._

Restless, Tony flopped onto his back and stretched; spine popping in an ominous chorus. He’d been pretty damn remiss in the area of personal hygiene lately, he thought, rubbing the back of a hand under his jaw. The underarms of the shirt he’d fallen asleep in were damp with sweat, despite the cool air of the room and he could feel hair sticking out at odd angles from his head. Unless drastic measures were taken he’d soon be giving Loki a run for his money in the grease department. _Christ, throw in some projectile vomiting, a dash of drunken groping and it was his freshman year, all over again._ Feeling vaguely disgusted with himself, he tossed back the sheets and slid out of bed. He needed a piss, a shower and some _very_ black coffee. 

“Status report, JARVIS.” Except for kicking off his shoes, he’d fallen into bed fully clothed. Heading for the bathroom, he shed clothing as he went; leaving a poly-cotton trail across the room. 

“Temperatures are expected to climb into the triple digits today and the National Weather Service has issued heat advisories for all of the tristate region. Road crews have moved into the area and will soon commence repair work. High noise pollution is to be expected around the clock.”

“Peachy. _Loki?”_

“Sleeping soundly, by all appearances. However, he continues, at random intervals, to tamper with my climate controls. Without counter-heating, I estimate that it would be well below freezing in the workroom.”

Standing in front of the bathroom mirror, studying his tired reflection, Tony paused in the act of pushing off his boxers. “You starting to notice a theme, JARVIS?”

“Indeed I am, Sir.”

“He tries to turn my basement into the polar tundra, he keeps giving Thor _frostbite . . .”_

“Thor has control over weather patterns and events, namely lightening. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that Loki has a similar affinity for cold.”

 _“An affinity for cold,”_ Tony repeated. Chewing that over, as he kicked out of his boxers. The first threads of an idea were forming in his mind; _a long shot._ “Access the Stark industries mainframe. I want all the specs we have for the ADS system copied to my personal server.” 

“The heat ray weapon developed for the military?”

“That’s the one. But let’s be quiet about this. I’m not sure we’ve patched all of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s holes in the corporate servers. Use whatever backdoors you’ve got to, to keep from being noticed.” 

“Are you suggesting I hack into our own database?”

“You,” Tony replied as he flipped open the toilet lid, “and your intuitive leaps.”

Twenty minutes later, Tony was shaved, showered, dressed in fresh clothing and back to feeling human. While showering, he’d remembered the metal fragment from the basement drain. It was still in the pocket of his discarded jeans, he’d realized ruefully and retrieved it before exiting the bathroom, taking it over by the balcony door for a closer look. 

The bright morning light revealed little that hadn’t been apparent the night before though. It might have been wootz, the tough, marbled steel used to forge Damascus blades, if it weren’t for the unusual weight and coppery tint. 

“JARVIS, where’s Bruce?” Maybe Bruce would find analysing a chunk of alien metal a welcome distraction from _The Waiting Game._

“The penthouse kitchen.” 

“Perfect,” Tony answered, again pocketing the metal. _“Prime the espresso maker.”_

“Already done, Sir.”

“Attaboy.”

 

Bruce _was_ in the kitchen. So was a giant blond man who was murdering something with a whisk, over the gas range. Tony’s brain knew those broad shoulders and weight lifter’s arms, but it took a few bewildering seconds for it to make the logical correlation. His image of Thor was so deeply connected with armour plating and billowing red capes, that he’d never considered an alternative. And looking at him now, decked out in an olive drab henley and factory faded jeans, Tony thought he understood what the first man to see a hairless cat must have felt.

"How . . . _where?"_ he asked, to no one in particular.

Thor shot him a puzzled frown over his shoulder. “You stand in your kitchen, Man of Iron,” he said, not letting up his assault on the contents of a double-boiler. “Have you already been at the spirits?”

“What? No, that’s not . . . _no.”_ Tony said. He turned to Bruce.

The physicist was hunched over the kitchen island, nursing a glass of OJ. Looking up, he shrugged.

 _"I,_ took the liberty," JARVIS interject into Tony’s offended silence. "Discreetly, of course. If word of you ordering another man's clothing were to get out- why that, coupled with your new found proclivity for leg shaving, would have the press beating down the doors." 

Tony grunted, lip curling back in an expression only the career drunk could mistake for a smile. 

“Oh,” Thor rumbled, _“the garments._ Yes, your servant was most helpful. He was also kind enough to locate a list of traditional earth dishes for me.” Picking up a small bowl from the counter he sloshed what looked suspiciously like lemon juice into the pan. 

“And It _cooks,”_ Tony said, exasperated and sidled up to the coffee pot, snatching a mug from the rack. “I’m trapped in an Old Spice commercial.”

Bruce, glass poised to drink, made a strangled noise in the back of his throat. Juice dribbled down his shirt front. 

“Steady on grandpa.” Pouring out a cup, Tony took up a place leaning against the refrigerator door. His original reason for tracking Bruce down hadn’t been forgotten, but he was reluctant to breach the subject with Thor in earshot. What would Thor read into his interest? _For that matter,_ how would Thor take an honest explanation, if he gave one. 

“JARVIS tells me this a customary morning repast,” Thor said. He was pouring sauce over a plated stack of eggs and English muffin, shaggy eyebrows twisted in concentration. “I must say I find your people’s love of burning your bread most peculiar.”

“No shit,” Tony gurgled through a mouthful of French roast; not really listening. Thor had proven himself a dependable ally, despite their initial bumpy start; he’d taken their side against Loki, throughout. But finding out that Tony was on the hunt for viable ways of _killing_ his brother? Odds were that wouldn’t make for the best breakfast small talk. 

“You got a minute to come down to the workroom?” Tony said to Bruce. “I need to pick your brain on EMP shielding.” 

“Sure.” 

Thor turned to look at them. “You are going down now?”

“Why do I feel like I’m going to regret a yes?” Tony said. Hopeful puppy didn’t begin to describe the look Thor was levelling on him. _Big eyes, slightly pouty tilt to the mouth. Oh yes, Watson,_ he thought, _something is afoot._ He felt for the guy’s mother. 

“I would ask a favour of you.” Picking up a plate and cup that was setting apart from the others, Thor thrust them at Tony.

“Not foreseeing that ending well,” Tony said. It didn’t take an IQ over 130 to guess the intended recipient of the toast and tea that Thor was attempting to pawn off on him. 

“If you are the one to bring them, perhaps the chances of him accepting will be bettered. What little assistance I have already tried to give,” he went on, before Tony had a chance to protest, “will only have him hating me all the more.” His last words were hesitant. Saying them, he turned his eyes from Tony’s, embarrassed, as though he’d admitted something he’d have rather kept back.

 _Goddamn it,_ Tony thought and slammed back another hit of coffee, _it was too early in the morning for sharey time._

 

"I can't believe I just got guilted into playing Nurse Nancy," Tony grumbled, once they were safely inside the elevator a few minutes later. He'd beat a hot retreat from the kitchen with Bruce in tow, but not before being loaded down with an armful of plates by Thor. Food, with one last dose of big, hopeful eyes. 

"I'm starting to think bipolar runs in that family,” he went on. “One second they're trying to gut each other and the next," he attempted a shrug, which sent a river of egg yolk flowing dangerously near to the edge of one plate. "Must be something in the water back on Tatooine."

"Logic doesn't always factor in where family are concerned," Bruce reasoned. 

"Speaking from personal experience?" Tony joked, realising too late what a stupid thing it was to say. He'd read S.H.I.E.L.D.'s dossier on Robert Bruce Banner, _PhD._ When old man Banner wasn’t trying to build the A-bomb, he’d passed his time by indulging in the age old tradition of getting shit faced and beating the wife and kid. Had earned himself an indefinite stay in the loony-bin by going too far one day and beating the wife to death. Bruce had tried to defend him at the ensuing trial, Tony remembered and had to suppress a guilty wince; had lied under oath and said it was all an accident. _Jesus Stark,_ he thought, _way to put your foot in it._

But if Bruce had taken notice of the comment, he camouflaged it well. “So,” he said, the slightest hint of a grin pulling at his mouth, “what’s the real reason we’re ditching?” 

“Thought we’d smoke some weed behind the bleachers and pick up chicks,” Tony answered, since lightening the mood seemed to be in order. 

“Yeah? Should’ve said earlier,” Bruce drawled. “Left my matches in the locker room.”

“Can you reach into my right, front pocket? There’s something in there I need you to take a look at.” 

Bruce let out a wheeze of laughter. 

“No, really. Trying to balance cups here.”

Bruce blinked in surprise. _“Oooh.”_

“Where did this come from?” Bruce asked, after a bit of mutually awkward twisting and balancing. Setting his glasses on his nose, he examined the metal fragment with a professional eye. “It almost look like-”

“Wootz, _right?”_ Tony said, lowering the plate he’d been holding above his head. 

“Right.”

“Rock of Ages pulled that out of his own back.” 

_“This_ caused that giant laceration?”

“Whatever it broke off from, yeah, seems like it. And from what I’ve seen, the terrible twosome heal _fast._ Part of their Nordic god mojo,” Tony said. “But the wound _that_ made-” he gestured twin coffee cups at the metal, “it wasn’t healing.”

“Nordic god _Kryptonite?”_ Bruce snorted, but he didn’t appear to be dismissing the idea.

“Why not?” Tony said, “Uraninite, Thorianite; naturally occurring minerals that, once refined, can be highly toxic to humans. It’s only logical that elements would exist that have similar effects on them.” 

“You think this thing could be radioactive, and you’ve been carrying it around . . . in your pocket?”

“Cheap thrills. Look, I was thinking you could run some test, see what you come up with.”

“It’s worth a shot,” Bruce admitted. He shook his head. “Thorianite. You just couldn’t resist, could you?”

“Accidental. Totally accidental.” 

_“Sure.”_

* * *

 

_He knows it._

_Thanos’ servants are drawing near to him, a small litter born between them. A dark cloth covers it, pooling over the litter’s sides, nearly to the floor, but nothing so paltry as a bit of fabric can disguise it from his senses. Loki can taste its power in the air; it rolls across his tongue, sweeter than honey, than a long missed lover’s kiss. He has felt it before, in visions long ago. But those were just teasing glimpses; pale imitations; illusions to its true might._

_Heads bowed, the servants stoop to place their burden at his feet, eyes gleaming with a barely restrained fear as they pull back the drapery._

_Loki is oblivious to them, oblivious to anything beyond the point of light before him, whose glow grows to fill the domed room. It’s small; little bigger than an bird’s egg, a mere shard, really, but the power of its parent- that master cube whose body it was hewn from, flows through it, untarnished._

_The Tesseract. Most precious treasure of the Allfather’s armory; lost during the great war._

_A piece of it lays at his feet._

_Try as he might to hide his excitement, his breath comes quick and shallow as he kneels and reaches out a hand to it, not touching, not yet. His fingers hover above it, pale and alien in the bluish glow as the limbs of some subterranean creature who shuns all light. Its energy sizzles through him._

_Ancient power, pure and untamed, waiting._

_**Take it.** He hears the words in his mind in a voice that is not his own, a voice he does not know. And yet, in its tones lay the voices of all those he's ever held dear and it whispers to him of distant worlds and the forming of the universe, of past, present, future. It calls to his bones and he aches in longing to possess it, down to his very marrow; an ache that chases away all other thoughts. _

_"Can you wield it?"_

_The question shocks him back into his body. He has forgotten Thanos' presence in the room. The Titan stands behind him, the Chitauri chief at his side. The Other is chittering impatiently, muttering indistinct words in its low hissing tongue._

**_They fear to use my power,_** the voice whispers. **They fear I will do onto them, as I did onto the one they took me from. As well they should. But you, child, you have no call to turn from me. Your fathers made me, when the universe was young. I will help you, I will remake you and show you all. Take what I offer. Know me.**

_"Can you wield it?" Thanos asks again._

**_Together, we can destroy them all._**

_His heart is pounding wildly. He has to control it before he can speak. "Yes."_

 

Loki was sleeping, hair pooled out around his head like an ink stain against the linens; chest rising and falling in the slow, steady rhythm of the unconscious. Standing over the couch, Tony studied the contours of the face that had recently made itself to home in his nightmares. Prominent brows; straight, aquiline nose; a razor’s slash of a mouth. If Tony were being objective, _could be objective_ about the murdering bastard, the guy was good looking. In a pointy, old world, sort of way. A little younger, a little less underfed and he could have been Ribera’s dead Adonis, cut straight from the canvas. Had the grey skin down, at any rate. As Tony stared, dark lashes quivered and Loki twisted in the blankets, murmuring half formed words under his breath.

“Sweet dreams of mass genocide?” Tony hissed, his voice pitched to a low whisper.

Glaring at the sleeping figure, he backed away, toward the centre of the room. The majority of the place was still in a state of disarray, Tony having done little in the way on rearranging. Unlike Bruce, he had a difficult time concentrating on cleaning, or anything else for that matter, with Loki around. That was _the_ big irony, he thought. Or maybe it wasn’t irony, so much as good, old fashioned rubbing of salt in the wounds. Working, tinkering around with gears and carburetors, rewiring circuit boards, was his way of dealing with stress. It was his own special brand of meditation; something logical and orderly to fall back on when everything else spun out of control. But how could he work and blow off steam when the source of his stress was napping not twenty feet away, like an overgrown cat? 

Circling around an overturned engine block that lay in his path, he went over to the nearest work bench and set down the plates he’d been balancing, letting them drop the last inch to the metal top. 

The resulting clatter had the god sitting bolt upright, all wide eyed and disoriented. For an instant he looked like someone else entirely, young and confused, something like fear in the furrow of his brows. Then the bright eyes focused on Tony and the expression resolved into his usual steely glare. 

“How’s the shoulder?” Tony inquired, aiming for most neutral topic possible as he placed both cups gently beside the plate. He’d grabbed a handful of sugar packets from the cupboard before leaving the kitchen. Pulling them from his pocket, he ripped the tops off three and emptied them into the tea. 

No answer. Loki was staring, mute, eyes tracking Tony’s every movement, like he was expecting a vial of battery acid to follow the sweetener. _If only,_ Tony thought, giving the cup a swish to mix its contents. “The big guy says you have to eat. Your big guy, I mean,” he added, doing his damnedest to remain civil sounding.

Loki’s gaze lifted to his face, thin lips twitching in what could have been annoyance or amusement or even pain. “I do not require food, Stark.” The words were quiet, distracted. His attention had drifted to nest of bed linens he was sitting in, the childishly puzzled expression of moments before, back on his face. 

Tony wondered how much of the night’s events he remembered, if any. He’d been, by all appearances, dead to the world while being hauled from the bathroom and after, when Thor’d been fussing like a mother over a sick kid; getting him dried off and settled on the couch. Tony wasn’t sure where all the blankets had come from. Hadn’t asked, when Thor had disappeared and then reappeared a few minutes later, arms piled high with them, but he suspected more than one of the upstairs guest beds was currently sans-covers. 

“Toast and tea,” Tony said, picking both up as he did. He crossed the floor back to the couch; easy strides, unconcerned, trying to cover his rising nerves. “Tea with lots of sugar. Good for people who’ve been leaving their blood all over my building.” He held them out to Loki in offering, stopping just short of the couch, but within arm’s reach.

Loki made no move to take them. He was studying Tony’s face, as though he could read something in the cool stare, head tipped back a little to compensate for his lower vantage point.

“It’s not poisoned,” Tony said, feeling impatience creep up on him. 

Lips pressed thin in amusement. “No?”

 _“I_ don’t go around poisoning people or stabbing them in the back. Not my style.” 

Loki’s eyes flashed with sudden satisfaction. “Ah.” The barest hiss of sound. “Now I understand.” 

"The hell is that supposed to mean?” Tony snapped, composure slipping. 

_“The hatred in your eyes,”_ Loki replied, calmly. "You would like nothing better than to see me dead. Even now you are thinking of it, of how it would feel to do it.”

Tony opened his mouth, to deny or agree, he wasn’t entirely sure. His anger was boiling over, making it hard to form full, rational thoughts.

"I see it in the others’ eyes too, of course," Loki went on, serene as someone relaying the forecast. "But it's different for you, isn't it? Personal. I couldn't understand why, until now, that is. I never could have imagined I was creating a martyr."

 _"Excuse_ me," Tony said, unclenching his jaw. His teeth were starting to ache under the pressure.

 _“Sir?”_

“Not now JARVIS,” Tony barked. The mug shook in his hand, sloping tea against its sides. He fought a childish urge to fling it at Loki’s head. 

“We have a member of S.H.I.E.L.D. at the door.” Short. Utterly to the point.

The words hit Tony like a bucket of cold water. _“What?”_ he asked, slowly, carefully, as though he’d misheard and wishing desperately that he had. 

“An Agent ‘Ross’, to be precise. He says it’s urgent.”

“Isn’t it always with these guys? _It could be nothing,”_ he added, hoping aloud.

“It could,” Loki said, sounding about as convinced as Tony felt. They exchanged a knowing glance. 

_“Shit.”_ Tony was thinking rapidly now, adrenaline clearing out the cobwebs of anger and surprise from his brain. If he made the wrong move, all hell would break loose. _Stay cool,_ he told himself, _take it slow. No mistakes._ “Okay,” he said, speaking to JARVIS, “Maybe they know. Maybe they don’t. If they do, then let them call our bluff.”

* * *

 

Tony’s hands were sweating. He wiped them on his jeans, watching the floor numbers rise above the elevator doors. _Two more to go._ He’d ordered the newcomer be directed to the penthouse lounge, as far a point from the basement as they could get, short of meeting on the roof. The agent was there now, waiting for him to arrive. 

“Bruce and Thor are out of sight?” he asked, schooling both his features and tone in preparation. 

“They took the emergency stairs down to R&D,” JARVIS answered. 

Before leaving the workroom, he’d instructed JARVIS to bring them both up to speed on the situation and tell them to lay low. Similar instructions to Loki and had earned him a chuckle and a disdainful roll of greens eyes, but no reply. He hadn’t pushed for one. There wasn’t time. 

“The Mark VII is on standby,” JARVIS said, as the elevator chimed, announcing its arrival at the penthouse floor. 

Tony nodded once, forcing his shoulders to relax, letting his hands hang loose at his sides. The doors slid open with a rush of scorching air. The last time he’d been in the room, it had been night and still relatively cool, outside and in. Not anymore. The plastic tarpping was a poor substitute for triple-paned glass and the temperature in the lounge had reached furnace-like levels. 

_“Agent Ross,_ what’s the emergency of the day?” Tony asked, strolling into the room; shirt already sticking to his back. 

The agent, who’d been surveying the damaged lounge, turned a pair of watery eyes in Tony’s direction. _Not the usual S.H.I.E.L.D. material,_ Tony mused, eyeing the limp mop of dishwater-blond hair and rumpled Oxford dress shirt. Tennis shoes too; high tops. He quietly let out a relieved breath. _Had to be a pencil pusher._

Ross was squinting at him, uncomprehending. _Hay fever?_ Tony wondered. The kid’s eye’s were glassy and red rimmed and set against a pallid face.

“I say, _of the day,”_ he said, walking past the agent, towards the bar, “because they change like school lunch specials. I’m sure you’re familiar with the concept, I mean, what are you, _ten?”_

His overturned glass was still lying were he’d left it on the counter, stuck to the marble by a thin layer of crystallised scotch. Hooking a finger under its lip, he popped it free and set it on its base.

__

“Mr. Tony Stark?” Ross asked, dully. 

Tony turned to look at the agent. “Are you on drugs or something?” he asked, staring dumbfounded at the blank expression the kid was giving him. 

“I think,” Ross said, reaching a hand into his jacket, “I’ll take that as a yes.” In one, unhurried motion, he pulled his S.H.I.E.L.D. issue sidearm from its shoulder holster and fired.

Three, well measured shots. 

There was no time to duck. The force of bullets’ impact knocked Tony back, throwing him off his feet. His last sight as he fell, was a dark blur, a fountain of red spray. And then the world tipped on its axis, and the sun went out. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Stealing a little characterization from comic Thor, for this chapter, because the idea of him cooking is too amusing for me to resist. Also, Bruce's family history. 
> 
> And Fun/Freaky Fact: That cheesy sounding heat ray device is a real anti-personnel weapon, developed by the US military, which for plot purposes, I've turned into a piece of Stark-Tech. 
> 
> Thank you everyone for your continued, invaluable feedback! And as always, thank you to Zak, for proofreading and being honest when things sucked! <3


	8. Chapter Eight

_If_ she ever caught him, she was was going to kill him, Cassandra Vue thought. She’d once again caught her foot on the hook of an exposed tree root and it took a second of flailing around, arms cartwheeling like a drunken trapeze performer to right herself. One of these times, she was going to plow headfirst into the ground and that would be it, game over. She’d land on a used needle, or somebody’s rusty, DIY shank. That was just her kind of luck. 

What had she been thinking, following Andrew on this stupid shortcut across the park? What, for that matter, had she been thinking, hooking up with an exercise obsessed chiropractor in the first place? Her previous boyfriend, _Jace,_ the deadbeat graphics designer, was prone to drinking diet Pepsi all day and never shaving, but at least he had more brains than to go jogging cross county-style in the Ramble. She didn’t care how much restoration work the Public Relations division of the Park Board claimed was being done. Any patch of trees where you saw more Durex wrappers than squirrels, was a pit. 

Swiping sweat from her forehead with the back of an arm, she trudged on. Out in front, a good half block in the lead, Andrew was trotting along, merry as could be, as though it wasn’t a hundred degrees even in the deepest shade. _That’s what you were thinking,_ she mused, eyeing the shift and bunch of muscles under his Armani exercise shorts as he plowed up the incline of a small hill. The trees were thinning. They’d reached an area in the park that was all hills and valleys and outcroppings of rock. Groaning, Cassandra began the climb herself, thigh muscles aching from the unaccustomed exertion. Andrew had already come to the summit of the hill and was starting down the other side. She watched the top of his blond head disappear from sight. And then quite suddenly, he was back, lips moving in a torrent of words she couldn’t make out over the music streaming from her earbuds. 

“Hold on a minute,” she said, pulling them out. The beat of Va Va Voom was replaced with the squawk of irate birds and the crackle of breaking twigs under Andrews feet as he tore down the hill towards her. He was gesturing wildly, his face ashen under its deep summer tan. 

_"Back_. . . go back,” he got out, between gulps of air, “back to the road.”

 _“What?_ Why?” she asked, continuing up the slope regardless. 

_“Dead,”_ Andrew gasped, his complexion rapidly shifting from grey to green. “Don’t.” He made a grab for her arm as she passed, but Cassandra shook him off and he didn’t try again.

There was an odd smell drifting in the heavy air, sweet and foul. It reminded Cassandra of being a little girl in the refugee camps in Taiwan; the times when someone would slaughter a hog and leave the unwanted portions of the animal to bake in the jungle sun. She could guess what that smell meant. Drawing air through her mouth, she plodded forward to the crest of the hill and looked around. It didn’t take a moment for her to spot the source of the stench. It was a bullseye of red in the green underbrush. 

Taking out her phone, she unplugged the earbuds and dialed 911. 

“Hello?” she said, when the emergency operator picked up. Her hands were shaking, but her voice was steady as she spoke: “I need to report a murder- I’m sorry, _murders,_ actually.” 

“Ma’m, where are you calling from? Are you in any danger?” 

“No. Central Park.” From behind her and back down the hill floated the telltale sounds of Andrew being sick.

“Do you know _where_ precisely in Central Park? 

“The Ramble, somewhere between Seventy-Ninth and the Bow Bridge.”

There was a pause, the line falling silent save for the faint, rapid tic of a keyboard.. “All right Ma’am,” the operator said, coming back on the line, “we’ve got a lock on your phone’s signal and emergency services are being dispatched. I see you’re not on one of the marked paths. What I need you to do now, is make your way back to the nearest trail and wait for them to arrive. Can you do that?”

Surveying the corpses that lay in the small valley beyond, Cassandra didn’t immediately answer.

There were two of them, their limbs twisted into unnatural positions. One was headless, the chest and upper extremities stripped of skin and flesh down the bones. The other; larger of the two, lay on its back. Its eyes were gone, the empty sockets black voids in its bloated purple face. But what held Cassandra entranced, was the corpse’s belly. It was ripped open, _split,_ like an overcooked sausage; entrails and other offal spilling from a cut that went from sternum to groin. And it looked as though whatever had torn apart the other, had been at work on this one too. A length of intestine had been pulled from the bloody mass that was bulging out like so much stuffing. It trailed across the ground, away from the body; a mock umbilical cord. 

“I wouldn’t bother with _emergency services._ Just the cops,” she said, finally, watching as a black cloud of flies rose in an lazy, undulating cloud from their bacchanalian feast. From her vantage point, the sound of them didn’t reach her, but she found herself imaging the buzz of a hundred miniature wings in her head. “All the CPR in the world isn’t going to do _any_ good.”

* * *

 

Someone was slapping his face. If they didn’t knock it the hell off, Tony was going start returning the favor. Just a soon as he got his eyes open. Which was harder than it should have been. His eyelids felt weighted and the light shining through them was impossibly, painfully bright. 

_Had he been drinking?_ That must be it. He’d been drinking and now he had the grandaddy of all hangovers. Pepper was gonna to go pyroclastic when she found out. Only . . . he didn’t remember drinking. Didn’t remember much of anything. His brain was fuzzy, memories all mashed together and rattling around in his skull like rocks in a cement mixer. 

“You should have been more cautious,” a voice shouted in his ear and his head pounded in time with each word. 

“Tony, open your eyes. If you don’t open your eyes and look at me, I’m calling 911.” Another voice, even louder, closer. Bruce, his brain eventual worked out, _and he sounded freaked._

“You are one to lecture on caution,” voice number three said, sounding bored. 

Tony cracked his eyes open a sliver and immediately regretted the action. The increased light made it feel as though someone had lodged an icepick through the orbits. Groaning, he clamped them shut again, nausea rising in his throat. 

“Tony?” There was a flurry of shuffling feat and then someone, Bruce he supposed, leaned over him. Tony was immensely grateful; their body was blocking out some the glare. 

“Can you do nothing for him?” the first speaker asked. This time he recognized the voice as Thor. 

“I’m not that kind of doctor,” Bruce answered. “We have to get him to the hospital,” he said with sudden determination. “He could have brain trauma.”

No, Tony thought. He couldn’t make his mouth work to say so. He tried to open his eyes again instead, but that too was beyond him. He was suddenly tired, so very tired. Even thinking was an exercise in willpower. _If he could just sleep, just for a few minutes._

“Let me try.” Soft footsteps, drawing close. The bored voice, whose identity his brain was still refusing to supply. 

“Oh no.” Bruce again. “No no no.”

“If I wished him dead, I would not have bothered to block the bullets.”

“Let him,” Thor insisted. 

Silence. Tony could hear Bruce breathing; long, deliberate breaths. The footsteps drew nearer and nearer. 

Bruce sighed, the sound angry, but resigned. “You hurt him,” he said, very calmly, _“you die._ We understand each other?”

A tisk, tongue clicking against teeth in disdain. “Such dramatics. _Very well,_ now move aside Banner, give me room.” 

For a moment nothing happened and then Bruce’s silhouette disappeared, letting back in the full force of the light. Another, larger shadow fell over him and the smell of blood was suddenly thick in the air. The contents of Tony’s stomach inched a little higher in his throat in response. _What was going on?_

Cool fingers alighted on his face, a brief ghostly touch, before sliding under his head and lifting it ever so slightly from the floor. The movement sent a stab of pain through his skull; working a groan from his throat. He groaned a second time as the fingers found a sticky, tender patch at the back of his head. 

“Be still,” the voice ordered. The words were hard, but the exploring fingers remained gentle in their examination. They slipped through his hair, pressing here and there, trailed down his spine; _tap tap tap,_ counting off the vertebra. The voice that went with the fingers gave a hum of satisfaction. “The injury is not as dire as it seems.” 

The touch moved back to his head, finding that same tender spot again, pausing there. There was a whisper of words, just loud enough for Tony to catch, but not discern their meaning. A strange, itch began crawling along his scalp, like the prickle of blood rushing back into a deprived limb. It spread and intensified, working its way deeper into the skin, until it felt like it was seeping though all the way to the bone. The sensation was so alarming, that at first, Tony was too distracted to notice that the pain in his head was fading. Without conscious thought, he felt his body relax, his breathing steady. As the pain faded, his thoughts cleared. Memories came back to him. _Thor in the kitchen; the floor lights above the elevator door climbing higher and higher, the doors sliding open; a gun raised, pointing at his face._

“Open your eyes,” _said Loki,_ hands slipping away as phantom shots rang out in Tony’s brain. 

Tony jerked upright. Too fast. The room spun crazily around him, _“Fuck,”_ he blurted in both surprise and pain and grabbed his head, which was once again pounding in time with his pulse. He remembered it all now, the S.H.I.E.L.D agent drawing his gun and firing, a shadow flying past him the second before everything went dark. 

Without thinking, he’d drawn up his legs and was resting his forehead against his knees. Forcing his eyes open, he looked around and nearly jumped in surprise a second time. Bruce and Thor were hovering over him, pale faces drawn in concern. 

“Vultures,” Tony croaked at them. “At least wait till I’m cold.” 

Bruce’s shoulders slumped in relief. “Thank God,” he breathed, a little shakily. “For a minute I thought . . . Well . . .” 

“What happened?” Tony asked. He could guess easily enough exactly what Bruce had thought. For a fleeting moment, he’d thought the same. “I don’t remember anything after 007 opened fire. Where is he?” 

Bruce’s face fell. He tipped his head to their right, directing Tony’s gaze. “He’s dead.”

Tony looked over, towards the stairs that lead down into lounge’s sitting area. Apparently a concussion played hell with a man’s situational awareness, Tony thought. That seemed the only sound explanation for why his attention hadn’t instantly been drawn to the arterial spray adorning the nearby patch of floor. Following the blood's path across the tile, he spotted the muddy toe of a white soled sneaker poking up behind the highest step. 

“Shit,” he said. “Give me a hand up?” He’d been speaking to Bruce, but it was an unusually reserved Thor who moved first; not so much assisting Tony, as picking him up and setting him on his feet, all without saying a word. 

_“Thanks,”_ Tony hissed, voice heavy with sarcasm. The sudden movement had jarred something in his brain and set his pulse thudding in his temples. Clutching a hand to the back of his head, he moved to the edge of the stairs and looked down. 

Agent Ross was very dead indeed; gun still clutched in his hand; he was all but decapitated. The windpipe and the fleshy parts of his throat had been torn out and the spinal column peeked pale and bluish-white through the blood that had pooled in the wound cavity. The missing hunk of flesh was still attached, hanging from the side of the neck by a thin strip of skin and tendon. 

_How?_ Tony almost asked as his gaze drifted higher, to the agent’s vacant eyes and gaping mouth, but the question remained unspoken. The answer, after all, was an obvious one. Dressed in nothing but his leather trousers, the culprit had draped himself across one of the chairs in the sitting area, bare arms crossed and legs splayed.

Sensing Tony’s gaze, Loki looked up.

“You ripped his throat out, _with your bare hands.”_ Tony said, in answer to the inquiring tilt of Loki’s eyebrows. “Mr. Magical Knives and you ripped his throat out.” 

“I do apologize for the mess,” Loki drawled, “I was ever so slightly preoccupied with making sure you weren’t eviscerated by a shower of bullets.” 

“Oh sure, so you just-” Tony’s reply fell short. Closing his mouth on the remainder of the words, he turned his gaze to stare down at his own chest. Between the shock of waking up to Loki playing doctor with his head and the sight of the dearly departed Ross, he hadn’t stopped to consider how he’d avoided being shot in the first place. The arc-reactor was a diffused glow through the fabric of shirt. Bringing up a hand, he tapped a finger against it, realizing how close to being dead he’d just come. 

This time, he did ask the question: “How?” What part of it he was questioning, if any part in particular, he wasn’t sure. 

“A shielding spell,” Loki said simply.

“He might have done little worse with the bullets,” Thor said, speaking for the first time. He’d come up behind Tony and was standing to his side, arms folded and expression disapproving. 

Tony did a double take. Thor’s hammer was hanging from his wrist by its thick leather loop. It occurred to Tony that the hammer hadn’t been with Thor when they’d arrived. _Where had it materialized from?_

“How was I to know he’d be thrown back like that?” Loki barked, snapping Tony back to the present. He’d half risen from his seat, propelled up by a sudden burst of anger and was scowling at Thor, lips drawn back from pearly teeth in furious snarl. “Not once before have I experienced such backlash when using that spell!” 

Uncrossing his arms, Thor jabbed an insistent finger at Tony. “Look how small he is!”

“Now wait just a minute, Rock of Gibraltar,” Tony objected, rounding on him, “by normal, non-alien-Fabio standards-” 

A loudly cleared throat, courtesy of Bruce, cut him off. “Folks?” Bruce asked into the resulting quiet. He was pinching the bridge of his nose, eyes pressed shut in concentration. _“Dead S.H.I.E.L.D. agent?”_

_Yeah,_ Tony thought, _and then there was that; that part that meant they were grade-A, bonafide screwed._ “I don’t know,” he said, in answer to the unspoken question he knew they were all thinking- all, it seemed, except Loki, who’d sunk back into the chair and was once again studying the fire pit like it contained universal secrets ripe for the plucking. 

“We haven’t much time before his comrades miss him,” Thor agreed. “But this city is vast, how long will it take for them to track him here?” 

“They don’t have to track him,” Tony said, “somebody in S.H.I.E.LD _sent_ him. They know where he is. It’s just a question of how long it takes them to figure out he’s bit the big one.”

Thor frowned, cocking his head at Tony. “But he must have acted under some compulsion of his own. What reason would S.H.I.E.L.D. have for wishing you dead?”

“Maybe they’ve decided to start weeding that potential threats list,” Bruce said.

Tony nodded. “That, or they know you two are here and that I’ve elected to withhold that fact, so now, they’re thinking I’ve turned traitor.”

“And this is who they choose as assassin?” Thor said, gesturing at the scrawny dead man. 

“He just about did the job,” Bruce pointed out. 

A sudden machine-gun-burst of laughter issued from Loki’s lips, catching them all off guard. Flinching at the unexpected noise, Tony looked up to find him watching them from behind the point of tented hands. “Yes?” He demanded, not sharing the god’s newly discovered good humor. 

Straightening, Loki sat back in the chair, displaying a chest smeared with Agent Ross’s dark blood. “I fear that for once, the golden son is correct. Though,” he added, dragging a hand through grease stiffened hair, “like yourself, he has overlooked the most salient feature of your visitor.” 

“That being?” Tony ground out. He was starting to wonder how much more of Loki his teeth could survive before bursting into powder. 

Loki’s lips twitched into a sympathetic frown, blood spattered forehead creasing in matching false concern. “That thing on your floor is not human.” 

Three pairs of eyes swiveled towards the body on the stairs. “Bullshit,” Tony stated, over the sound of Bruce’s unconvinced splutter.

“Of course!” blurted Thor. “I thought its smell strange!” 

The room’s two human occupants turned to stare at the Thunder God in disbelief. For a moment the only sound was the crackle of plastic tarping rustling in the wind. Finally, Tony spoke, pronouncing each word with excruciating slowness: _“Come again?”_

Thor blinked at him. “I . . . was not intending to leave?”

 _“No,”_ Tony practically sobbed in frustration, “that’s not . . . _forget it._ ”

“Have you ever know a human to have blood of that shade?” Loki continued, raising his own voice for emphasis. He was staring pointedly at the dark puddle surrounding the body. 

Raising his head, Tony stared too. _Goddamn it if Loki wasn’t right,_ he saw with a jolt of surprise. Backlit by the bright mid-day light streaming into the room, that first spray had looked red, but pooled on the floor, it was nearly black. He hadn’t been unconscious that long, a few minutes at most. Too short a time for the agent’s blood to start oxidizing. 

“JARVIS?” 

“Yes, Sir?” 

“Does Rock of Ages' story check out?” 

Loki shot him a withering look.

“I can garner very little information from the corpse in its current location. However, let me test the chemical makeup of the blood. . .” There was a pause as the computer ran its check.

“How’s he getting a sample?” Bruce asked in a whisper. “Don’t tell me you have sensors in the floor?”

“Robotic nose principle,” Tony answered, with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Tiny particle of a substance get released into the air. If you can smell it, JARVIS can probably detect it.”

 _“Sir,”_ JARVIS said. “His statement is likely true. My sensors are not recognizing the “blood” as human.” 

“Alright then,” Tony said. His exasperation was quickly giving way to dread, but he kept his voice even. _“If not human?”_

“If _my_ nose serves me truly,” Thor interjected, “it is Chitauri, or something very similar to one.”

“Mr. Odinson is correct,” JARVIS said a second later. “I’ve just run the results against the sample of Chitauri genetic matter we have on file and it appears to be a match.”

With a single nod of his head Tony silently turned on his heals, marched behind the bar and pulled down a bottle of Makers Mark, ignoring Bruce’s neigh of protest. He needed a drink, concussion and hour of the day be damned. Dumping two fingers worth into a glass, he tipped it back. His mind was drowning in an disordered wave of questions as the alcohol burned a firey trail down his throat. Grabbing the first one that surfaced he threw it out and poured a refill. “Why and _how_ does it look human?” 

“The Chitauri are capable of shape shifting,” Loki answered, as though that were the most common place thing in world. “As for the how, I’m not entirely certain. I’ve only heard talk. I never witnessed one shifting with my own eyes.” 

“Oh, well that’s just . . . _great,”_ Bruce said, which summed up Tony’s own feelings on the matter pretty effectively. “Why didn’t they- _wait,_ where do you think you’re going?”

Alerted by Bruce’s question, Tony glanced up. Loki had risen from the chair and was climbing the stairs towards them. Pausing on the first step to look between the three of them, he gave a disparaging sniff. “To bathe. _Again.”_

“What about that?” Tony demanded hotly, jabbing a finger at the corpse.

“You are three _allegedly_ grown men,” Loki said and stabbed with elevator’s down button with an air finality. “Surely you can deal with one dead body.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Chitauri being shape shifters, is taken from the comics. (there's very little background information to go off of in the movies)
> 
> Thank you, everyone who commented on the previous chapter! <3  
> You're all absolute dears.


	9. Chapter Nine

For all the dead bodies he’d created since that day in Afghanistan, Tony had spent relatively little time contemplating what to do with one after the fact. The agent’s corpse couldn’t be destroyed, that much was certain; at least not until they’d run further tests to confirm that it really was something other than human. And even if they could have, their options inside the tower were limited. Acid, he knew, was rarely as effective as the movies made it out to be and the largest of the laboratory's incinerators was too small to burn a body in without having to first dismember it; a task he doubted anyone, except maybe Loki, would be jumping to volunteer for- _Loki, Tony suspected, would be thrilled to recreationally dismember whole villages, were the idea his own and accomplishable without getting his hands dirty._ The problem then, was one of storage and in the end he’d decided on the first floor kitchen’s walk in cooler. There was a freezer there also- his first choice- but Bruce had insisted that freezing the body could potentially degrade any samples he might need later on.

The task had been unpleasant, but not particularly difficult, given Thor’s added muscle. It had been the work of ten minutes to wrap the body in an excess length of plastic tarp; leftover from covering the hole in the lounge’s wall; and haul it down to the first floor. Now the body lay concealed behind a wall of boxed dry goods, that Tony’d had JARVIS make a note to have thrown out the moment they were no longer needed for camouflage. That done, the three of them had retreated to separate corners of the tower. Leaving Thor as the lookout for further homicidal house guests, Bruce had disappeared to the lab with a fresh batch of samples to test and Tony to the work room, in search of Loki, _and answers._

But his quarry, he discovered, was still showering; the rush of falling water audible through the bathroom’s flimsy door the moment Tony stepped into the workroom. Hearing it, he’d had a brief, mischievous urge to have JARVIS cut the hot water and hurry things along. Tempting, but he quickly dismissed it. His ears were still ringing and his heart thudding from his recent brush with mortality- a repeat encounter was _. . . unnecessary_

So he resigned himself to waiting, turning his attention instead to the ADS system he’d thought of that morning: a time that felt years away after the chaos in the lounge. Despite the excitement, JARVIS had succeeded in retrieving the weapon’s schematics from Stark Industries’ corporate servers and one eye trained on the bathroom door, Tony pulled the files up on the computer and began perusing the contents. If the weapon was going to be of any use to him, it would have to be miniaturized and integrated into one of his suits. Ideally in either the armor’s gloves or chest plate. Which, short of a full redesign, meant some rearranging on the Mark VII was in order. Just the kind of complicated project he needed for a distraction. In spite of the steady thud of pain in his skull, a swell of nervous energy had settled over him. His fingers itched to create, to build.

Giving the blueprints one last look, he closed the document, had DUMMY start mixing him a drink at the work room's built-in bar and got down to business.

The Mark VII’s torso was set out on a worktable near his desk, its armored chest plates stripped off, by the time Loki reappeared. Tony, who’d deliberately positioned himself facing the the bathroom as he worked, glanced up from the Mark VII’s circuitry at the sight of the door sliding open. “I was starting to think you’d drowned.”

Loki ignored him, combing fingers through wet hair as he surveyed the room to a backdrop of steam hazed air. He seemed to be expecting something, or someone, aside from Tony.

“Thor’s upstairs,” Tony offered.

“What of it?” Loki asked, tone practically oozing nonchalance.

“Nothing.” Suppressing a grin, Tony returned his attention to the power connector he was attempting to pry loose, pretending as he did so, not to notice that Loki immediately gave up on searching the room.

Leaving the doorway, the god stalked over to the desk, where Tony’d abandoned the breakfast plates and picked up the mug of tea. From the corner of his eye, Tony watched him give the liquid a measuring sniff before raising it to his lips. Immediately, his nose wrinkled in a grimace of disgust.

“That,” he pronounced after a forced swallow. _“Is repulsive.”_ Lowering the mug he gave it a distrustful glower.

“If you’d drank it while it was hot, instead of _staring at it_ like it was going to crawl up your ass and bite ya’, it wouldn’t be so bad.”

“I doubt that very much.” He took another sip, regardless. “I take it you found a way to dispose of your visitor?”

The image of the thing called Ross, rose unbidden in Tony’s mind; _blank eyes staring up through a layer of plastic, mouth frozen in final gasp of surprise._ “Mostly-” _-a gun barrel leveled on his chest-_ “Shit!” An abrupt jerk of his hand had popped the connector free, snapping off half the pins as it came away. It occurred to him that his right hand was trembling; little twitching spasms in time with the beat of his racing pulse. He pressed his palms flat to the table, willing his nerves to calm.

“DUMMY,” he barked, after a steadying breath. “Find the soldering kit.” Heaving a sigh, he carefully reached for the needle nose pliers he’d laid out on the table. “We stashed him in the fridge,” he continued, going back to the topic of Ross, as he yanked the first of the pins from the female end. “The process of getting the blood out of my floor grout, however, is ongoing. Neat job ripping out his jugular for maximum spray.”

Loki’s lips curled around the mug’s rim in the faintest trace of a smile. “I was, as I told you before, busy keeping you from being shot.”

 _Which was something, now that he thought about it,_ Tony mused. “What, so you can’t work more than one hocus-pocus at a time?” he asked, with as much offhanded blasé as he could heap on.

Loki, who’d been observing DUMMY’s hunt through the workroom detritus from over the top of the mug, lowered the tea with a roll of his eyes. “Oh please.”

_“What?”_

“Stark, if your imagination grows any more febrile, there’ll be steam pouring out from your ears.”

 _There just wasn’t a good response to that statement,_ Tony decided, once he'd worked out what the hell “febrile” was supposed to mean. Shrugging, he pulled free a second pin.

“That gesture," Loki said, squinting at him. "What does it signify?”

“Hmm?” Tony hummed, still intent on the connector.

“The rolling of the shoulders. I’ve seen a great number of your countrymen use it.”

Choking down a laugh, Tony looked up. “Shrugging?” he asked, the chuckle escaping his lips despite his best efforts to fight it. “That signifies me knowing when it’s time to keep my trap shut. _Lest I should incriminate myself,”_ he added, mimicking Loki's quasi-European drawl.

“Indeed,” Loki replied with a sneer. “That was not an act of self preservation I thought you capable of.”

“Hah hah.” Final pin removed, Tony set both connector head and pliers aside on the worktable. “Yo, _DUMMY,_ sometime before I die of old age? _No,_ the silver case,” he groaned, glancing in the robot’s direction. “It’s three inches from you!”

Snorting, Loki went back to drinking his ‘repulsive’ tea.

“Well?” Tony asked him. “You going to level with me, or what?”

The god’s eyes narrowed to peevish slits. _“Level_ with you?”

DUMMY rolled up to the table then, toolkit contents rattling as it swayed from the machine’s metal pincers. Taking the case, Tony hefted it onto the table and snapped it open. “I keep forgetting your guys’ earth vernacular dropped off somewhere around longboats and salted fish,” he said at length, as he began spreading out the tools. “It’s time for an exchange of information, is what I’m getting at. You know how it works. You want my help- _our help-_ you share what you have.” He locked his jaw before the explanation could dissolve into babbling. His tongue and brain felt like they were having connection issues. _Was that a sign of concussion?_ he wondered. _Or scotch?_

“The Chitauri.” Loki stated, expression blank.

“The Chitauri, this ‘leader’ of theirs’ you mentioned, the Tesseract. But what the heck, let’s start with the overgrown horseshoe crabs.”

“I know practically nothing of the Chitauri,” Loki replied, in the tone of a man who’d long since tired of answering the same question.

“Yeah? Well, we don’t know jack-shit,” Tony replied, slapping a roll of solder against his open palm. “Which means you, big guy, have still got the advantage on us. _DUMMY,_ grab the pliers and get that pin in place.”

Directing DUMMY on the placement of the pin, he bent back over the armor’s open chest plate, soldering iron and solder in hand. It was a tight fit, trying to maneuver the tools inside the Mark VII’s chest cavity. Too many jittery hands, _not enough space._

“To the left a little- _my left._ Just line it up- no, stop!” he hissed. The robot had knocked out another pin while trying to align the first.

“I’m converting you into playground equipment,” he threatened. “I swear to god.”

“What in the Norns’ name are you doing?” Loki inquired, sounding not overly interested in getting an answer.

 _Thinking of ways to fry you like an ant under a magnifying glass?_ “Repairs. _Damn.”_ This time it was his hand that had slipped, skinning his knuckles in the process.

“Honestly,” Loki snapped. Draining the remains of the tea, he set the cup back on the desk and circled around to the opposite side of the work bench from Tony.

Seeing him draw closer Tony stiffened, heart thudding against his ribcage. Instinctively his eyes drifted to the screwdriver at his elbow. If Loki was feeling temperamental, would a philips to the eye socket buy him enough time to make a run for it? His only functional suit in the tower currently lay in pieces on the table in front of him. How fast could Thor or Bruce make it to him, once alerted by JARVIS?

“Calm yourself, Stark,” Loki said, reading something in his sudden change in posture. “Were I plotting defenestration, I’d have chosen a higher floor for the task.”

 _Had Loki honestly just cracked a joke?_ Tony stared, dry mouthed as the god carded spidery fingers through his hair, pulling it back to twist into a knot behind his head. For the first time since their initial confrontation in the lounge, Tony found himself looking at Thor’s little brother. _Really looking._ Skin pink from the heat of the shower and dressed only in leather trouser and his black undershirt, he looked less like some god of old and more like a man. A strikingly well formed, abnormally tall man, granted, but a man. Seeing him like that one could almost forget the monster that was lurking behind the sharp, green stare. Almost, _but not quite._ Even free of blood and the raiments of war, an air of death remained; clinging to him like the stink of a cheap aftershave.

Tension pooled in the pit of his stomach; a confused, acidic mix of fear and excitement. “What are you doing?” he found the voice to ask, as Loki lowered his hands, apparently satisfied with the ponytail he’d gathered his wavy hair into.

“Give me that,” Loki ordered, his words and gaze directed not at Tony, _but DUMMY._

Shrinking back, DUMMY gave a whirring whine of protest.

 _“Now,”_ Loki insisted, palm upturned in expectation.

As Tony looked on in stupefaction, DUMMY whined a second time, before dropping the pliers into the waiting hand and backing away, all the while chittering dejectedly to itself.

“You’re not- You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Tony said.

“Hardly.” Planting his elbows on the table, Loki leaned in to inspect the armor. “Where does it go?” he asked, indicating the broken pin.

Tony was still gaping at him, his hair standing on end on the back of his neck. _What was this? Intimidation tactics? A white flag? No._ The realization hit Tony with the force of a mac truck doing eighty. _It was a challenge. It was mind games._ Say no and he’d be admitting to them both that Loki intimidated him, that he didn’t consider himself a match without his armor to protect him. _Damn it,_ Tony thought. _And damn him._

Screwing up his courage, he huffed out a breath under the guise of annoyance and gestured at the rows of connector pins. “Any of the spots where they’ve snapped off from here. You just have to hold them steady while I do the tricky part.” He hoped super olfactory senses weren’t part of the Asgardian package; his underarms were already prickling with nervous sweat at the idea.

Without further prompting, Loki deftly plucked the pin up and positioned it above the first broken point in the row. From that new angle, Tony could see that his shirt was still torn across the back of one shoulder, revealing the spot that had only yesterday been an open wound. Now that same spot was covered in a new layer of skin; not healed completely- _the flesh retained the pink tinge of scar tissue-_ but well on its way. 

“Like so?” Loki asked after a moment, when Tony had yet to make a move. _“Stark?”_

“Huh? Yeah,” Tony said, snapping out of the nervous daze that he’d started slipping into. “Yeah, that’s fine.”

Loki’s hands proved to be steady. Steadier at any rate than Tony’s, though Tony’s jitters were mostly to do with the Loki’s proximity. He had a vague recollection of the god cradling his head in those hands, magic seeping from his skin, into his own and that memory was nearly as unsettling as the memory of Loki’s fingers about his throat. _Why had the arc reactor rendered him immune to the Tesseract's power, but not Loki’s own?_

At first they worked in silence; Tony only speaking when a pin’s angle or height required adjusting. It didn’t take detailed, verbal instructions for two reasonably intelligent minds to work in unison on this kind of a project. As they were placing the fourth pin though, Loki began to speak. His eyes were downcast, watching the play of Tony’s hands as he wielded iron and wire.

“I’m still not wholly sure _what_ they are,” he began and it took a second for it to click in Tony’s brain that they were jumping back to an earlier subject. 

“How is that not something that comes up in conversation?” Tony asked.

“I was not in a position of asking questions for much of my time among them and what little I did learn, well, my recollections of that time are hazy at best.”

Tony decided to let that pass, for the moment. _“But?”_

“But,” Loki spoke slowly, the words lacking their usual conviction, as though he were deciding for himself as he went along. “I believe them to be the branch of some older, more powerful race of creature. I caught whispers to that effect - _from the few,”_ he added with a hint of wry amusement, “intelligent enough to speak; reference to the ‘father race.’”

 _“Hold up,_ they can build advanced, space going warships like the ones I saw on the other side of the portal, but they can’t speak?” Even as Tony asked though, he knew that on this point, Loki was likely telling the truth. During the battle, he hadn’t heard anything resembling a language passing between the invaders, although, until that moment, the significance of it hadn’t struck him.

“Not the majority. There are few, the rulers, whose minds are on par with beings like yourself. Most though, are little more than drones. Weak, _stupid,_ but singularly vicious. That is what makes them so effective, so dangerous. They are an army completely devoid of concern for their own lives. They exist only to destroy. Indeed, that seems to be the sole purpose of their race.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“They move like a great ant colony; sweeping across galaxies, destroying everything in their path and yet the worlds they conquer seem to hold no value to them. Once a world is razed, it is abandoned. They destroy, for destruction's sake.” Loki’s bright eyes flicked up to meet his. "You're shaking, Stark."

 _He was, again,_ he realized. "Adrenaline." Forcing his hands to still, he turned his eyes back to the circuit board. "Almost got- what was the word you used? Eviscerated? Remember?"

Loki ducked his head, the action nearly quick enough for Tony to miss the smirk that was twisting his lips. He made a disbelieving hum.

 _Speaking of adrenaline,_ Tony thought; _what the hell, libido?_ The sensation of warm breath ghosting across his fingertips was eliciting an unwelcome stirring in points south. _Great._ Good old, indiscriminate biological imperative. Nothing like a brush with death to get the juices flowing and in reaction to the worst possible subject. Loki was taking it a bit far, even for his self acknowledged danger kink. In defence, he started hurriedly conjuring the most erection stunting mental images he could dream up. Gangrene, raw sewage, _Justin Hammer performing an erotic striptease._

"So what's their play, now they've got the Tesseract?" he asked, with more force than he'd intended.

If Loki noticed, or heard him at all, he gave no indication.

"Nuclear weapons?" Tony ventured, straightening up, the repairs temporarily forgotten. He clarified, as an afterthought: "Explosives? Like the one S.H.I.E.L.D. launched?"

"Perhaps." Loki didn't sound convinced.

"What then? Assault weapons? Transport of some kind? They must be planning on using it to power _something."_

Loki exhaled in the manner of the long suffering and pushed himself up from the work table. "The possibilities are near endless. Vaster, I wager, than anything you’ve yet imagined."

"Hey, I'm just thinking of things life forms _"on par with myself"_ would come up with," he shot back. He hadn't missed the god's earlier barb, just elected to ignore it.

"On par in intelligence, but not, I think, in knowledge or understanding. You persist in thinking of the Tesseract in the terms of some earth battery. It is not. Has Thor explained _nothing_ to you?"

"Apparently not. So thrill me, oh bottomless well of knowledge." 

Loki grinned, eyes flashing in an expressions that made Tony’s skin crawl.

 _"Enlighten_ me," he dully amended.

"Very well." Loki folded his arms, still grinning. "The Tesseract is a power source. But not any power born of nuclear fission." And now there was a hint of the mischievous in his eyes. "It is _life energy,_ power of the purest form. It can power a bomb indeed. However, it can just as easily power a man or any other living thing. Make them stronger, more resilient, grant them powers they would not normally possess, or enhance existing powers."

Tony quashed the impulse to start humming the RoboCop theme. "By powers, you mean magic."

"Yes."

“And you think _that’s_ the plan?”

“That is how I would employ it, were I in Thanos’ position.”

“Thanos? He the alien crab head-honcho?”

“For the moment. He uses them as a sort of mercenary force, although he is . . . apart from them, in both race and-”

“Another Asgardian?”

Loki let out a short laugh. “No.” There was a guarded edge to his words that hadn't been there seconds before. “He said he was a ‘Titan,’ but he was . . .” For a moment he faltered. “. . . _Strange. Powerful._ Beyond anything I had encountered, beyond on anything I had dreamed.”

“So, alien with a god complex, bent on conquering the tiny humans. Great, fantastic- _familiar,”_ Tony said, covering the last word with a cough into his balled fist.

“He has no designs on the Earth or its people. He never did,” Loki replied, comment punctuated with a tired roll of his eyes. “Understand this; whatever Thanos' plan _is_ , it is not one of conquer. You and your comrades made a fool of him when you wiped out the Chitauri’s armada. _That_ is what drives him now. _Revenge._ Recompense for his slighted reputation."

"Which equals-" Tony began.

 _“Annihilation,_ Stark. That will be his aim. Earth and every being on it, will be made an example of and when he is done, when he is finally satisfied that he’s killed every man, woman and child in the most horrific ways imaginable, the planet itself will be no more.”

“For a guy who wasn’t ‘privy’ to his plans, you sure seem certain,” Tony deadpanned.

Loki laughed, suddenly and shrilly. “I am certain,” he said airily. “Because _that too,_ is what I would do.”

 

* * *

 

In, _out_. In, _out._

_Anger is not the enemy, bend it to your will._  
 _Inhale,_ exhale.  
 _Now hold, focus, feel the energy flowing through your body._

"Doctor Banner?" came the voice of JARVIS, intruding into the familiar mantra

Bruce didn’t respond at once. His eyes were closed, chin resting against his unmoving chest. Then, with infinite slowness, he inhaled, consciousness surfacing to the outside world as air filled his lungs and flooded his oxygen deprived blood stream.

 _Inhale._ Exhale. _Inhale._

Finally, when his breathing had returned to a normal cadence, he allowed his eyes to open and raised his chin from where it had been pressed into hollow of his throat. The brightly lit lab was a shock to his eyes. Blinking, he shook his head to clear his brain.

"My apologies for interrupting your meditation," said JARVIS after a few seconds had ticked by. "But preliminary results on the first batch of samples are finished and there's something I believe you'll want to take a look at."

"What's that?" He stretched his arms above his head, splaying his fingers, flexing stiff joints. Satisfied, he reached for his glasses.

"There is no match between the samples."

"We were expecting that." Adjusting the glasses on his nose, Bruce stood and went over to the nearest monitor, sore muscles protesting at the sudden movement.

"Not to this extent. If you'll examine the readings I've already taken the liberty of bringing up, you'll observe that T1 and L1 are not a familial match. That much we expected, but if you turn your attention to L2, our control sample . . ."

As instructed, Bruce skimmed the report of the control sample. “What the-” he began after a moment, mystified by what he was reading. Pulling his glasses off, he rubbed his eyes and looked again.

“As you can see,” JARVIS said, in response to his baffled silence. “L2, although sharing some hereditary genetic markers with L1, appears to be of a completely different phylum. In addition, the sample is rich in an unknown protein not found in either of the other two samples.”

“Protein?”

“Yes. The nearest match in the databanks is found in a subspecies of arctic Notothenioidei.”

“Go easy on me here JARVIS,” Bruce said, replacing the glasses. “Taxonomy isn’t my field of expertise.”

In answer, a picture flashed up the monitor, obscuring the reports.

“Really.” Bruce said, staring.

“I’m afraid so, Sir.”

Bruce opened his mouth to say something, closed it again. _“Huh._ I don’t suppose Tony . . .?”

“Not,” JARVIS said, “to my knowledge, no.”

“Huh.” There was a moment of silence while man thought and computer expectantly waited. “You have security footage of the workroom from that night, right?”

“Certainly, Sir.”

“I’m thinking,” Bruce said slowly. “That deserves a look.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone for your continued feedback! ♥
> 
> -And hey, look! The two main characters are actually interacting!
> 
> Oh, a little aside, for those of you that don't follow me on Tumblr- I got bored one day and put together a soundtrack/fanmix thang' for the story. You can find it [HERE](http://tmblr.co/ZHwh4wjG1HZd). ;)


	10. Chapter Ten

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Opening of this is a little freaky. You've been forewarned.

_Darkness. Silence. The knife’s point is keen. If there is one thing the Chitauri can be praised for, beyond their mindless tenacity, it’s the quality of their weapons. It’s nothing much to gaze upon; crude, as are most of their weapons, but the tip pierces flesh, drawing blood sheerly from the blade’s own weight resting upon his skin. His stomach clenches at that first sting of cutting metal and the action forces the air from his lungs; the blade’s point slipping a little lower with the movement, cutting a weeping trench as it descends._

_The room is still and utterly cold, perhaps that’s why he feels so little pain as he inhales and the rising of his chest buries the knife’s tip in his stomach, or perhaps even his nerve endings have finally developed a sort of tired apathy. Whatever the reason, he sends out a silent thank you to the three spinners for that mercy as he counts his breaths. He feels the blade slipping in and out with each new rise and fall, working deeper with each stroke, in a bloody mockery of coupling. The thought threatens to bring a laugh to his lips._

_“Should you not have light for this?” Thanos’ words float through the darkness, intrigued, but unconcerned. “Should you falter, it will be your flesh a Chitauri shall feast upon.”_

_For once the Titan’s trusty shadow is not with him. Loki has barred The Other entrance from the room until after all is finished. He will not perform this task with the Chitauri leader looking on, scenting his blood like some underfed hound. Slathering in anticipation that a slip of his hand will bring about his end. Nor does he trust The Other would not grow impatient and lend assistance; rip into his flesh with its bare hands._

_“There is no need,” he breathes after an interim._

_A rumble of laughter fills the room at his words, mixing with the sound of his own stilted breaths.“Why?” Thanos inquires, in the same conversational tone. “Does the Godling fear the sight of his insides?”_

_Loki smiles, tongue darting out to wet cracked lips. True, he has no desire see what he is about to do, he’s already closed his eyes against it. It is for the very purpose of vexing Thanos though, that he’s left the room in darkness. “Your henchmen would have killed me dead of fright a hundred times over were that the case,” he says and he nudges the dagger deeper._

_Just a little more, a little further._

_He presses harder yet, his palms clammy with sweat despite the chill; shaking, but their grasp on dagger’s hilt does not slacken until something gives way. His body convulses at the sensation; the slick, sickening snap of the blade piercing that last protective layer of muscle and sliding home. Mouth opening in a silent gasp, he falls forward onto one hand, the other still gripping the weapon._

_There is warmth then, running down the length of the blade, over his hand. It trails down his arm in sultry velvet rivulets to pool in the crook of a bent elbow, where it falls to spatter numb legs and cold, unforgiving stone. The iron tang of it floods his nostrils, makes him gag; throat working to expel the contents of an already empty stomach. Acid and saliva pool in his mouth, dribble unnoticed over parted lips._

_“Lost your nerve?” comes Thanos’s voice again and fabric rustles behind Loki as he rises from his seat._

_“A moment,” Loki growls with all the fierceness he’s able, trying to think beyond the agony that’s suddenly consuming his being. The merciful numbness has fled, leaving white hot pain in its place._

_Thanos is coming towards him, moving easy as a man walking in the light of high noon. The whisper of shifting fabric marks his progress across the room. He doesn’t speak again until he’s at Loki’s back, where he kneels, leaning in so near that Loki feels those next words on the nape of his neck._

_“You ask for time,” the Titian rumbles and with a sudden, fierce grip, closes a massive hand on the back of Loki’s neck. In the same instant his other hand clenches Loki’s own where it clutches the knife._

_Loki’s left paralyzed, the unfamiliar sensation of fear weighing down upon his breast with a force equal to Thor’s blasted hammer. Power. The power radiating off the Titan, not Thanos’s physical hold on his body, is what leaves Loki frozen like snared game._

_“Time,” Thanos repeats, a sneer twisting the words. His grip on Loki’s hand tightens further still, till the delicate bones are ready to give under the force._

_“We have no time,” he says and the world explodes in white light as he jerks the knife down._

 

Loki came awake to the bright lights of the workroom with a gasp, fear clutching his chest in an iron grip. Mind trapped in the dream, he frantically kicked back the heavy blankets that were twisted around his legs; blankets that felt like so many clutching fingers, and half fell, half staggered to his feet to press shaking hands to his stomach. Dry, unmarred skin met his touch. Panic ratcheting higher at the discovery, he clawed back the hem of his shirt, fingers seeking the wound that was sending lancing pain through his abdomen. All the while, someone was speaking to him. He was dimly aware of a calm, insistent voice calling to him as he made a panicked inventory of his own skin. 

_They were calling his name._ Only it wasn’t his name, hadn’t been since- He came back to himself with a vertigo inducing start. 

_A dream._

The force of his relief hit him like a kick to the diaphragm, bending him double, bringing him to the floor. _It had been so real, so vivid._ The phantom sting of cold metal, sinking through flesh. He shuddered, a chill jolting up his spine at the memory.

“Mr. Odinson?” It was Stark’s servant who’d been speaking, was still speaking. “Are you unwell?”

“No.” Inwardly he cringed at the wavering voice of the stranger that answered. He was being weak, pathetic. Letting himself be frighted by nightmares, like some babe barely out of swaddling clothes. A sudden memory came to him with the thought: _a vision of the woman he’d once called ‘mother’ bending over him; tendrils of gold haloing her head as she smoothed soft fingers down the curve of his face._

A growl built in his throat. He would not dwell on that woman and her laughing eyes. She had been as much a liar as the All-Father, with her talk of belonging and love and her’s were lies that had been tenfold more potent. That had been proven when she’d come to him in the void. The image of her, nothing but a brittle illusion of energy projected across the vastness of space, had nearly broke him. Her hold was that strong. For a few pathetic, precious seconds, he’d forgotten everything they’d done to him, all that had transpired. He was that naive little boy again, frightened and wishing he could hide himself from the world in the folds of her skirt. 

“Mr. Odinson? Are you certain you’re-”

 _“I am well,”_ he grit out. Ignoring the computer, he turned his mind inwards, regulating his breaths, forcing himself to draw the tepid air slowly into his lungs, until his heart also slowed to match its rhythm. Feeling infinitely steadier, he opened his eyes and mind to the workroom and shoved to his feet. 

“What is the hour?” he demanded, brushing dust from his pants. The floor, he noted with distaste, was a far throw from clean. 

Mid motion of dislodging grit, his hands began unconsciously drifting back to his stomach. _Again that childish urge to check for damage he knew full well wasn’t there._ Catching himself, he forced both his hands _and his temper,_ down. 

"Four forty-seven,” came the curt answer.

 _Was that morning, or night?_ he wondered. He felt hazy, ill rested, as if he hadn’t slept for long. Morning then. His gaze wandered longingly back to the couch and its comfortable ocean of blankets. _He should attempt sleep again;_ his healing body needed it, craved it like a drug, but the dreams were too fresh in his mind to allow him rest, tired as he was. Better to busy his mind with some distraction.

“Computer,” he asked after a moment, an idea occurring to him; mind flashing back to the image of Stark’s dumbfounded face as he’d made his pronouncement of Thanos’s intentions. “Where is Stark?”

The idea of another verbal sparring match with the human was exhausting. But then, as much as he’d have been loathed to admit it, so was the idea of sitting in the basement with his own thoughts for company. Perhaps Stark could prove amusing. 

“Sir is currently on the north penthouse balcony.”

“Awake?” he asked. He knew the answer. No man as frenzied as Stark had been would be peacefully sleeping a few hours later. The human had been near frenzied with anxiety during their conversation. A natural enough reaction, Loki supposed, for one recently reminded of his mortality, though there had been something else- something more than fear at the root Stark’s agitation, that he’d yet to categorize. 

“He is,” the computer said, confirming his hunch. “Would you like me to direct you upstairs?”

“I take it my leaving this level will not raise the alarm?” he ventured.

“No. I have been instructed to allow you free access _within_ the tower. Though, should you attempt anything I deem suspicious, say tampering with Sir’s equipment, or trying to leave. . .”

 _When had that change been made? After the appearance of the Chitauri scout?_ “Very well,” Loki said. “Lead on then.” Straightening his shirt, he turned towards the door, a whisper and a quick gesture of his hand mending torn fabric and bringing boots to his feet. A small act of magic. Worth sparing. He’d spent long enough traversing Stark’s citadel garbed like a beggar. “Oh, and computer?” he added, pausing before the door. 

“Yes?”

“I am no son of Odin.”

There was silence, the computer considering his statement. “What then,” it said at last, “would be the correct moniker?”

“I am _Loki,”_ he answered. “Just Loki.”

 

* * *

Tony’d known who it was, long before he’d clapped eyes on a body or face. The footfalls were a dead giveaway; that furtive tread that was too heavy to be Bruce and too stealthy to be Thor. All the same, knowing what was coming didn’t do anything to repress the reflexive surge of alarm that twisted his gut when he finally raised his gaze from the pint bottle in his hands, eyes lifting just enough to see heavy black boots in the doorway.

“Miss me already?” he asked the boots, concentrating not to the slur the words; tongue inarticulate from hours spent working through the single malt. He’d tried to sleep, fell into bed sometime after midnight, but the dreams of a few night previous had been back with a vengeance. 

It had started out the same. The smoke, the confusion, _the screams._ But this time he hadn’t woken up. Instead he’d started crawling towards Pepper, lungs burning, rubble cutting into his hands. It had hurt, hurt like nothing he’d felt before, not even a chest full a shrapnel. Still he’d kept going. He couldn’t stop, couldn’t die. Not yet, not without touching her, one last time, not anywhere other than at her side. _He’d been so close. He could almost reach her hand. Only a few more inches._ That’s when the world had fallen away beneath him. The roof had crumbled to dust under his hands and he was falling, not through the ruins of the tower, but the dark void of space. Falling and out of power, out of air, the portal looming below him, a rapidly narrowing beacon of light. _Too slow._ He wasn’t going to make it.

He’d jolted awake, a scream trapped in his throat and trying to claw its way out. How he’d ended up out on the balcony after, he didn’t remember beyond vague impressions. The chill air in the tower had been too close, too sterile. _Surreal._ He’d had to get out. The bottle of Glen Grant was a quarter empty by the time the world re-solidified and he was back in his body; not an observer, watching from the sidelines. His shirt had been soaked through with sweat and his back was aching from Christ knew how long spent huddled against the railing, but he hadn’t budged. The heat, the racket of men and machinery working in the streets, the smell of fresh asphalt and oil, were solid, _tangible._ A safety line to reality. 

Loki was still standing immobile in the doorway. Tony let his gaze traverse the length of god’s lithe frame, up legs and torso and chest until he reached and met Loki’s searching look. Even in relative darkness, those green eyes were disconcertingly bright. 

“Donning the mantle of liquid courage, are we?” Loki inquired dourly.

He sounded as tired as Tony felt, despite his words. Looked it too; fingers of one hand absently worrying his shirtfront like he was only half present. Maybe that’s why Tony didn’t automatically snap back at him, just kept staring. That impenetrable, smirking expression of his was plastered in place sure, but his eyes, like his voice, had betrayed deep exhaustion. 

“Trouble sleeping?” Tony asked genuinely curious, but also unable to resist the chance for a return jibe in the process. 

For the briefest second, a look of surprise overshadowed the smirk. “No,” Loki snapped, a little too quick, a little too forcefully. Then the look was gone, melting back into nonchalant amusement.

 _Gotcha,_ Tony thought, a smile of his own forming on his lips. “Yeah,” he drawled, not bothering to hide the sarcasm from his voice, enjoying the way Loki visibly bristled. The alcohol coursing through his bloodstream was making him reckless. “Yeah, me neither. I simply enjoy the peaceful serenity that only comes with sitting in my own sweat at the asscrack of morning.” 

Loki glared- not quite the murderous, full on snarl Tony had been expecting, but close- and muttered something under his breath. _Judgments on his mother's virtue, Tony'd bet._ “Did I not need you alive,” he began in a louder voice.

“Yeah, but you do,” Tony crooned, shooting the god a toothy grin. “Unless the whole Chitauri thing is a load of-” Tony’s phone chirped, cutting him short. He must have slipped it into his pocket before coming out, though he couldn’t recall having done it. Then again, he had fallen asleep in his clothes, so maybe it had been there the entire time. Fishing it out, he found that JARVIS was trying to contact him. Outside the tower and the suits, they normally communicated through Tony’s earpiece- another victim of the battle. Tony still hadn’t bothered with having a replacement fabricated and his backups, like so much of his tech, were in Malibu. “Good morning sunshine,” he said, clicking answer.

“Sir,” JARVIS returned without preamble. “Someone is at the Park Avenue North entrance.”

Tony rolled his eyes. _“Come on JARVIS,_ did you forget to take your ginkgo this morning? Someone? You going senile on me?”

 _“Sir,_ video and audio feeds on the Park Avenue entrance were wiped out during the attack and require manual repair. Only our thermal security sensors are currently operational."

 _Fair enough._ “And?” 

“They are warm blooded, Sir.”

“Oh well that’s great. It could be anyone from a S.H.I.E.L.D agent, to a reporter, but we can now safely rule out Godzilla. Very helpful.” Getting a knee under himself, he started to rise.

“What side of the building is that?” Loki asked, motioning for him to remain where he was.

“What? This side. Right under us. Why?”

“Is that not a great coincidence?” Loki said, stepping out onto the balcony. “A visitor choosing the entrance that will allow you no advanced knowledge of their identity?”

“Maybe. Probably. Look,” Tony said, exasperated. “I can’t _not_ answer. If it is S.H.I.E.L.D., not answering that door isn’t going to win me any brownie points, it’s just going to make them ten times more paranoid.”

“Then let me look instead.”

“Look? How? You are _not_ teleporting down there to have a look see.”

“I shall do as pleases me,” Loki growled, with fresh venom. “However,” he relented, “I must agree that would be a less than subtle route of investigation.” Motioning again for Tony to stay put, he crossed to the edge of the balcony. As he walked, the fingers of his other hand were making a rapid series of movements, tracing strange patterns in the air.

“What are you up to?” Tony hissed with a growing mix of impatience and apprehension as Loki drew up to his side, putting him at the uncomfortable eye level of the other man’s groin.

“Do you wish to know who they are, before going down there?” Loki snapped irritably, clearly oblivious to Tony's discomfort. _Thank god for small blessings,_ Tony mused. “Yes?" Loki, prompted. "Then hold your blasted tongue a moment.” Stepping up to the railing he grasped it and leaned parlously over the edge; out far enough that the road crew’s sodium vapor lights illuminated his face in a ghostly white glow. 

Curious, Tony rose to a crouch, straining his neck to look out over the glass barrier. Despite the awkward angle, he could make out a sliver of the street between the intersecting angles of the tower. The ground level was a frantic hive of activity even at that early hour, bodies and machinery rushing around like confused ants. 

As Tony surveyed the street, Loki, hips braced against the low barrier, released one hand's hold and made a sweeping motion through the empty air. His lips were moving again, forming words, but no sound reached Tony’s ears. _More magic._ He hoped that JARVIS’s sensors were effective this far out. Maybe they’d finally get a proper reading on Loki’s powers. 

“If you’re hexing somebody, so help me, _this time_ I’ll throw you off the building,” he warned. 

No reply. Loki was still silently muttering to himself. Tony was severely tempted to wave a hand in front of his face, because his eyes, fixed on the street, had taken on an eerily blank glaze.

“JARVIS, what kind of mumbo jumbo is he pulling?” he demanded, returning his attention to the phone clutched in his hand.

“Uncertain, Sir,” JARVIS replied instantly. “I am picking up a spike in energy readings. They are, however, not a match to anything I have recorded thus far. The spike is higher than when Loki caused a dagger to appear, but lower than levels associated with teleporting. Also, I have yet to- Sir?”

 _“What?”_ Tony snapped.

“You may wish to catch him.”

“Catch him?- _Shit!”_ Distracted with JARVIS, Tony hadn’t noticed Loki tipping slowly forward. Without thinking Tony was dropping the phone, grabbing two fistfuls of black shirt, just as the god’s feet left the ground. Twisting, he kicked out a foot against the railing and yanked, throwing all his weight backwards. 

They landed with a thud on the balcony floor, Tony’s already tender head smacking into the cement, making a galaxy of stars explode behind his eyelids. 

“How dare you!” Loki shouted, rolling off him, miraculously animated once more and Tony belatedly remembered that noise sensitivity was a prolonged side effect of concussions.

 _"What the hell?"_ he shouted back and promptly clapped both hands over his ears. _Apparently his own voice wasn't an exception._ Cracking open an eye, he glared at Loki through the lights that were dancing along his optic nerves. “The ground start to look real darn appealing?” 

Loki blinked at him, uncomprehending. He was breathing hard and fast, like he’d sprinted a mile, nostrils flaring with each exhalation, a look in his eyes that could have melted tungsten. After a beat his gaze slid away from Tony’s, back to the railing. “Oh,” he sighed, expression softening infinitesimally.

“Yes, oh, you ungrateful ass,” Tony said, sitting up and tasting blood. _Must have bit the inside of his mouth when he fell._ “I don’t doubt,” he went on, pausing at the twinge that passed through his right cheek as he spoke, “that you guys could survive skipping off a skyscraper and all, but now didn’t seem like the best time to test that little hypothesis.” Rolling over onto hands and knees, he managed to push himself up, swaying a little as he stood. His head pounded with renewed vigor, clearly displeased with the concept of being vertical. “Again, I ask you, what the hell was all that?” 

Loki combed a hand through his hair, brushing back black strands from his eyes. He exhaled in dramatically long suffering fashion. "I lost my balance." 

"Blowing my mind with revelations here, but clearly not what I meant." 

_"Stark,"_ Loki said in that emphatic tone that Tony was already growing far too familiar with; the one that meant Loki believed he was being mind numbingly obtuse; the one that usually spelled trouble. "Rogers is on your doorstep."

 

Steve was a dark outline in the doorway; the alien invader disembarking his spaceship in one of those old timey movies where everyone wore hats and had subpar instinct for self preservation. Ground side, what had been a soft glow on the upper floors of the tower was a burning, million candlepower glare. Or maybe that was just a side effect of being in that awkward point between drunk and hungover, while also sporting a concussion. Feeling his retinas starting to boil, Tony raised a hand to shade his eyes as he waved Steve through the door. 

“Tony,” Steve said jovially, striding in, clapping Tony on the shoulder as he passed. 

“Cap,” Tony returned when his teeth had stopped rattling around in their sockets. He elbowed the door shut before any more of the looming dust cloud outside could join them. 

“I was starting to think I wasn’t gonna raise you,” Steve said. “Your buzzer on the fritz?” 

"Naw, it's just not a morning person. So what's up? Fury hear about that alien hovercraft I smuggled out in my pants?"

"Fury?" Steve asked with such plain dismay that Tony gave up keying in the manual door locks and turned to look at him; quick enough that he caught a glimpse of uncertain blue eyes under furrowed brows before Steve could finish successfully repressing them. _Was Steve genuinely there on a social call_ , Tony wondered, _or a better actor than the old propaganda puff pieces had let on?_ The embittered part of his brain that had spent upwards of forty years dealing with politicians and corporate blood suckers, wouldn’t let him dismiss the possibility that Steve was secretly a world class snake oil salesmen. If he _was_ acting though, he was good. _Goddamn expert,_ what with the way he was staring at a point over Tony’s shoulder, face that resolute almost-smile that Tony remembered from the posters a teenage him had taped to his dorm room walls. Not that he’d be owning up to _that_ phase while he was still drawing breath.

Clearing his throat with a lingering trace of awkwardness, Steve took a white cardboard box out from the crook of his elbow and raised it for Tony’s inspection. “Doughnuts,” he said. His gaze edged back to Tony’s face. “Or did you already have breakfast?”

Had it been _anyone_ else, Tony would have asked if distilled wheat counted. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, long time no post, neh? I'm so sorry you've had to wait this long for an update.  
> Full discloser? Along with a keyboard that decided to keel over on me, I've been fighting the suspicion over the past few chapters, that I'm writing crap. Boring, pretentious crap to be precise. I feel like I'm bludgeoning everyone over the head with 'plot' and it seems a little like lying to have this in a Tony/Loki tag, because it's taking so long for anything to happen between them. Aka, probably not what anyone signed up for. So, yeah. I'm going to try and improve that, condense my original outline, etc and I apologize to anyone who's died in a pool of their own boredom thus far.  
> Oh and Zak, thanks again for putting up with all my craziness. You're the best, full stop.


	11. Chapter Eleven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ADDITIONAL WARNING FOR THIS CHAPTER: _Second scene contains detailed descriptions of decomposition in a human corpse. If this makes you uncomfortable, you may want to skip to scene three._

Steve kept squinting at him on the ride up, quick little micro glances from the corner of his eye - trying and failing to look without getting caught. Tony supposed he looked and _smelled_ like hell, so he couldn't blame Steve, not exactly. Steve on the other hand was, of course, meticulously tid; the picture perfect eagle scout all grown up in his pressed slacks and horrendously dated button down shirt. The only indication that he'd just trudged through an active construction site in ninety degree weather, was a light covering of dust on his loafers, the faintest sheen of sweat along his temples. The scientist in Tony absently wondered if that was just another part of the package- _heightened heat resistance_ \- or one of fate's subtle karmic middle fingers to the rest of the species. Not that Tony was feeling any pangs of flagging self confidence. On him, a little motor oil looked plenty fine. He'd nailed enough Maxim models on his workbenches to attest to that, but it just wasn't right, wasn’t natural, for anyone to look that clean before sunrise.

“So, what’s got you roamin’ the mean streets? You didn’t come all this way just to bask in the glow of my company, _radiant_ as it is.” That forced Steve to turn and look at him in earnest. Tony met his guarded gaze, his own expression making no secret of his suspicion. 

A confused frown flitted across Steve’s features. _“It’s Saturday,”_ he said after a moment, as if the this was supposed to hold some meaning to Tony. _“Church,”_ he added in response to the perplexed look still on Tony’s face, an unspoken _‘duh’_ he was too polite to voice, hanging from the word like a punctuation mark. 

Tony’s snort of disbelief was out before he had a chance to think better of it; out and echoing in self accusation around the cramped space as Steve’s expression morphed into a tight jawed stare. The noise degenerated into a choking cough, Tony snapping his mouth shut hard enough to make his teeth clink. 

“Cap,” he said and had to bite his lip at the warble of amusement that lingered in his tone. Shaking his head, he raised both hands in a gesture of mollification, trying as he did so to think serious thoughts and wipe the grin from his face. Not a struggle Steve was dealing with. He looked about as serious as cardiac infarction. “I’m sorry,” Tony finally managed in a marginally mellower tone. “I’m just not used to- hell, I haven’t even been inside a church since...” 

_“December 2006, Sir,”_ JARVIS supplied, making Steve jerk in surprise. 

“What the hell?” Steve exclaimed. He gaze darted wildly around the elevator for the voice's source, his eyes enormous and dark; dilated by a sudden rush of adrenaline so that only a sliver of bright blue remained at the edges. 

It hadn’t occurred to Tony till that moment that Steve had yet to encounter the AI. 

_“Though I’m not certain it should be counted,”_ JARVIS went on airily. “Given that by the time of your visit, the building had been converted to a rather disreputable-”

 _“That,”_ Tony interrupted, before JARVIS could get too informative, “is JARVIS.”

Steve’s gaze swiveled to meet with his. _“Jarvis?”_

“He’s kind of like, my assistant,” Tony explained. “Run’s my houses, tries to keep me in line. Ain’t that right J?”

“A battle doomed to failure, Sir.” 

“Should’ve programed him with a little less personality,” Tony said, with an accusing flick of his eyes at the nearest camera. 

“Progra- you mean it’s a machine?” Steve replied, a hint of awe creeping into his tone. 

“A learning AI- _'artificial intelligence,'”_ Tony explained. “Started writing his codes my final year of college.” _And why did Steve need to know that again?_ he asked himself the moment it was out of his mouth. Something about Steve gave him terminal ratchet jaw. “Anyway, like I was saying, sorry.” 

Reminded of their previous topic of conversation, the building look of wonder fell from the other man’s face, expression becoming guarded again. The corner of Steve’s mouth twitched minutely. “It’s fine,” he said, though it clearly wasn’t. He turned his gaze away from Tony, in favor of staring at the elevator’s control pad and unbent enough to add: “I know a lot of folks don’t believe in that kind of thing now. Not like they used to. Howar- _your pop_ \- he was never all that religious either, come to think of it.”

The sudden mention of Howard caught Tony off guard and unexpectedly on the raw. “My old man had two gods, Cap,” he said, with an edge of bitterness the surprised him. “Mr. Tesla and Mr. Jim Beam.” _Yep, there he went again saying more than he needed to. Too personal. Too honest._ More melodramatic crap that Steve had no need _or right,_ to know. 

And now Steve was watching him with the same hard look in his eyes, but there was something else underlying it, another emotion concealed behind that tight jaw and set mouth. _Pity,_ Tony thought, disgust adding to the already toxic mixture churning in his stomach; disgust with Steve for whatever it was he was thinking, disgust with himself for saying what he'd said to prompt those thoughts. He could take Steve’s anger. Hell, he could take Steve straight up and openly despising the air he breathed, _but not that._ The thought of Steve’s pity made Tony want to knock the look right off the soldier’s chiseled face. Tamping down his ire, he checked the floor numbers above the door, saw that they only had one more to go. _Not a millisecond too soon._

“Isn’t that hard though?” he asked, rewinding topics, beating a hasty retreat into impersonal territory. _Well, impersonal for him._ “Believing in some single, omnipotent being after everything we’ve seen?”

Steve sighed, the sound low and resigned. “Thor, Loki- I might not know exactly what they _are,”_ he said with an unamused chuckle. “But they’re _not_ gods.” 

_“Granted,”_ Tony conceded. The elevator had slowed to a stop and as he spoke the doors slid open on the penthouse sitting room. The strong, tantalizing tang of brewing coffee was drifting from the direction of the kitchen and a flicker of alarm crossed Tony’s brain. If JARVIS had failed in telling Thor to make himself scarce and he was playing Mrs. Brady for the second morning running, Tony was boned, _hard._

 _Hell, no help for it now though._ Steve was already half out of the elevator and surveying the darkened room. It was a little late to claim “wrong floor” and body slam him back through the doors. 

_Plan plan plan, Tony needed a plan. Hadn’t the dossier said Thor had a thing for some chick he’d met in New Mexico? Foster-something, astrophysicist-_ that was it. If it came down to it, they could tell Steve he’d dropped by for an intergalactic booty call. _Simplistic, just awkward enough to be true._ Perfect. _Except maybe the “booty call” part._ Explaining modern earth hookup vernacular to Out of Touch Blonds ‘One’ and ‘Two’ _simultaneously_ was no way to kick off a morning, not when he already had a headache going. 

Hoping Steve hadn’t noticed his stall-out, he motioned for him to follow and headed for the short flight of stairs that led into the kitchen, whose lights were on and spilling a golden glow down the steps. Plodding up the stairs, he resumed talking to calm his nerves. “But them not being the real bonafide deal, that’s the thing that really raises the questions. Pick your religious pleasure-” As he mounted the top step, the kitchen came into view and with it, the man that was sitting at the kitchen island. _Bruce._ On the off chance that there was a higher force, Tony sent them a silent ‘thank you.’ 

Having heard them coming, Bruce was already looking in their direction; watching them over the top of one of Tony’s pads. He crooked an inquiring eyebrow at Tony, the question clear: _did Steve know? Were they going to tell him?_ Tony mouthed a quick, emphatic _hell no._ “Don’t you agree, Bruce?” he asked aloud. 

Bruce tapped the pad's sleep button, set it aside on the table. “I don’t argue theology before breakfast,” he replied over Steve's startled greeting of: _"Doc."_ -having clearly overhead at least part of what Tony’d said on the way over. He smiled sympathetically at Steve and added in his customary, self deprecating way: “Bad for surrounding structures.” 

* * *

Dr. Michael Argent distractedly rinsed soap suds from his hands, watching the bubbles as they swirled away and disappeared through the stainless steel drain catch. Above the sink a window air conditioning unit chugged away, streaming a cold breeze across his face. Not the freshest perhaps; the reek of garbage and traffic that permeated the city air was ever-present, but it was still far sweeter than the mix of rotting meat and bitter cherry that hung like ozone in the basement room that housed the office of the New York County Medical Examiner. As a young intern in North Carolina, his then-instructor Dr. Winters: a fidgety, aging man in coke bottle glasses, had assured him that after a few years, he’d be immune to the smell. _He’d lied._ Over the years his stomach had stopped reacting with rebellion at that first whiff of spoiled pork stench, but the power of the odor had never lessened. 

Hands washed, Argent turned off the taps, swiped a length of paper towel from the countertop stand to pat dry his hands. 

Behind him the swoosh of a door’s hydraulic arm and the familiar scrap of a gurney’s edge along the frame announced the arrival of his assistant Abigail Doyle and with her, their first case of the morning. 

“And what do we have today Ms. Doyle?” he asked, tossing the wad of towel into the nearest neon-red waste receptacle.

“John Doe, one of a pair found in the Central Park Ramble. Suspected homicide,” Doyle rattled off with her usual lack of preamble. “NYPD wants him and his buddy fast tracked. Lead detective is coming down to observe.”

“He’s late then. Who did the on-scene?”

Maneuvering the gurney and its sheet wrapped occupant into place beside the table and locking the wheels in place, Doyle pulled a clipboard from under her arm. “Bishtawi,” she said after a second spent squinting at the papers over the lip of her face mask. 

Argent nodded, pulling two pairs of gloves from the dispenser. He snapped them both on, one over the other and put out a hand to take the clipboard. As he skimmed the preliminaries, Doyle slid the body onto the table and began unwrapping the sheets. As he’d expected, the report was thorough and to the point. Bishtawi was competent. The kind of technician you wanted on the job if you couldn’t make it out to the site yourself, as was all too often the case.

“This one’s been cooking awhile.” What parts of Doyle’s face that were visible under the protective wear, were scrunched together in displeasure. “Definitely past the sell-by date,” she drawled like someone auditioning for part of the Wisecracking Film Noir Cop.

Sighing, Argent flipped a page in the report. _He couldn’t fault her work, but Doyle had the emotional development of a fruit fly._

The door banged open for a second time and he looked up to see a slim, strikingly attractive woman in a severely tailored black pantsuit striding in, trailed by Jeff Higgins, their photographer. The woman had a sidearm strapped to her hip, half hidden by her suit jacket and a gold badge clipped to her belt. The detective had arrived _and it wasn’t a ‘him.’_

“Dr. Argent?” the woman asked in a clipped tone and then without waiting for a confirmation: “Detective Lieutenant Knight, Manhattan Homicide.” Thankfully she didn’t attempt to shake his already gloved hand as so many did. “Roads are still hell,” Knight added, acknowledging her late arrival with a glance at the clock on the far wall, but making no apologies.

“You’re in time for the main event,” Argent replied. “Protective wear is on the cart behind you, Detective. Suit up and we’ll get started.” 

Knight moved wordlessly away to don the requisite gear along with Higgins and Argent turned his attention back the subject of their combined interest. Doyle was just twitching the final layer of sheet aside to reveal the corpse. As she pulled it back and let it drop, she let out a low whistle, the sound muffled behind her paper mask.

Agent raised an eyebrow in agreement, making a quick visual sweep of the corpse. Unpleasant, though far from the worst he’d seen in his twenty years of death investigation. 

“I hope you remembered to bring the morning crossword Detective,” he said, circling back to the counter. “This looks like it could be an all-day event.” Reaching over to the computer keyboard, he hit the key to turn on the overhead microphone. “The date is May 12, 2012. It is five o’ eight in the morning. Present are Dr. Michael Argent, Dr. Abigail Doyle and photographer Jeff Higgins. Observing is-” he paused indicating to Knight that she should state her credentials for the record. 

The detective was now in protective wear, her halo of dark curls barely contained under a surgical cap. She stepped up to the table, sparing only a brief glance at the body. “Detective Lieutenant Misty Knight, Manhattan Homicide. Badge number 1629.” 

Argent nodded, gave the straps of his own mask a final tweak before he began laying out the preliminaries. “This is case number 32-71B. In front of me, I have the body of an unidentified adult male. Caucasian, between the ages of eighteen and thirty-five. Subject has curly blond hair. Eye color is. . .inconclusive. The eyes themselves are not present, possibly due to animal activity. Height-” He referred back to Bishtawi’s report. “Five feet, eleven inches. Weight-” Again he paused. _“Weight also inconclusive._ In addition to a large incised wound to the abdomen, subject has a shattered skull. In both cases at least partial organ loss appears to have been sustained, again, possibly due to animal activity. Doyle, let’s get fingernail clipping and swabs, so we can get started on those fingerprints for Detective Knight, get this fellow identified. Photographs first, if you’d be so kind Jeff.” 

As Doyle untied the paper bags covering the corpse’s hands and Higgins moved into position, Ardent glanced over to Detective Knight. She was observing intently from the end of the table, hands clasped studiously behind her back. At the flash of Higgins’s camera, she blinked, averting her eyes to the floor.

“Detective Knight? The body was found in this state of undress?” Argent asked. Official protocols stated that a clothed body should never be undressed until in a controlled environment and Bishtawi’s report had made no mention of garments, but one could never be too cautious. Screw ups happened, even with the best of investigative teams. And after the events of the previous week, the day and night rush to identify the victims of the attack, none of them could claim to be running at one-hundred percent.

“That’s correct,” Knight replied shortly and Argent thought he detected a hint of impatience in her voice. 

Dismissing it, he looked back to the body, scanning for identifying features Bishtawi might have missed. Finding none he turned his attention to the abdominal wound, making a brief inspection as he waited for Doyle to finish her work with the hands. 

_‘Incised wound’_ although technically correct, didn’t do it full justice. Neither, for that matter did, _‘large.’_ The wound was massive; a split in the muscles and soft tissue that went from the sternum to just above the pubic crest, exposing the abdominal cavity and effectively eviscerating the body. Scavengers had likely played a role in further displacement of the internal organs- decomposition had set in, exacerbated by heavy insect activity, but gnaw marks were still clearly visible on the exposed lower ribs and large portions of the organs and soft tissue had been torn away in hunks. _Too extensive for rats._ The work of feral dogs perhaps. Man’s best friend rarely had qualms about making a meal of its would-be masters. Leaning in so that his face was just inches from the torn, stinking flesh, Argent examined the colony of maggots; still and dead after a night of refrigeration; who’d taken up residence there. Calliphora Vomitoria- _blow flies._ Maggots could greatly increase the rate of decomposition, liquefying their host’s flesh through their process of rapid burrowing and feeding. He moved up to the corpse’s head, where they had clustered in the empty eye sockets and nose and inside the mouth; around the edges of the protruding tongue. Eyeing them, he ran a quick calculation in his head. _No signs of pupal development._ The little creatures were still in larval stage. _That,_ combined with the heatwave they’d been enduring, meant time of death had probably been no more than forty-eight hours ago. He didn’t share this conclusion aloud, however. There would need to be further tests, calculations that included the corpse’s exact location and factored in the surrounding environment. Something as minor as a body laying in shade, versus sun, could be an important deciding factor. 

“Dr. Argent?” The impatience in Knight’s voice had intensified. 

“Yes, Detective?” 

Hands still clasped behind her back, Knight took a step forward, heels clicking on the cement floor. “Dr. Argent, I realize that external and trace examinations must be performed first, but if I could make a request. The back of the skull-” 

“I’m sorry?” Argent interrupted. The question had taken him by surprise. _Was it possible that this woman, already a Lieutenant, had never before attended an autopsy? Maybe she was part of that affirmative action bunch; female officers promoted beyond their experience to show a more balanced workforce._

“I understand that this is highly irregular,” Knight said evenly, taking in the no doubt flummoxed look on his face. Her eyes were bright with excitement. “But in my examination at the crime scene, I noted certain marks on the skull. I want your opinion on those marks and I want it as soon as humanly possible Doctor.” 

_No,_ Argent thought, studying her, _she knew exactly what she was doing._ “We can perform a cursory visual examination,” he said slowly, unnerved despite himself, by the force of her gaze. 

At his words, Knight swooped in to stand at his shoulder, movements smooth and deliberate as a pouncing cat, her eyes fixed unflinchingly on the corpse’s mottled face. “The occipital bone,” she said, raising a gloved hand to direct his gaze. “At the very edge of the break. Do you see these scrape marks, where the scalp and subcutaneous tissue have been torn away?”

Squinting, Argent made a noise of assent. “These are teeth marks, Detective. As you’ve surely noticed,” he went on, feeling the creeping beginnings of annoyance returning. “This body has seen heavy activity from scavengers.”

“But Doctor, _the pattern.”_

Expelling a sigh, Argent bent his knees, crouching slightly for a better view of the area she was indicating. The “marks” were a pattern of indentations where a series of regular, sharp edged object had penetrated through to the underlying bone and then sheared away the soft tissue. Tooth marks, _as he had just said. The scalloped half crescent shape could be nothing el-_ Argent’s brain abruptly ground to a halt. 

_No. No it couldn’t be._

“I thought as much,” said Knight. Her voice seemed very far away.

“Doyle? Doyle come look at this,” Argent stammered, feeling cold sweat breaking out at the back of his neck. 

A moment later, Doyle was crowding her way past Detective Knight and hovering at his side. The Detective took a step back to give her room, staring at Argent with a singular intensity that would have made his skin crawl had he not been in such a state of distraction.

“What the?” Doyle said, crooking her neck. “That looks like _…like…_ well, _fuck me.”_

The part of Argent’s brain that was still taking notes, wondered if that would get a good snicker from a jury someday in the not so distant future. “I need a forensic dentition down here, _now,”_ he said, voice wavering. 

Straightening up, Doyle stared at him, a leering jut to her dark brows. “Fava beans,” she intoned in a forced vibrato as Knight strode away towards the exit doors. “Fava beans,” she repeated, “and a nice chianti.”

_Yes, sometimes, he **really** hated this woman. _

* * *

_Funny how his life crises always seemed to end in deep-fried foods,_ thought Tony, pressing down on the edge of a frosted bismarck with his fork. The fluffy cake split under the pressure, a clot of raspberry filling extruding from the crack and oozing onto his plate. 

“It’s Ockham's razor,” Bruce was gurgling through a mouthful of juice as Steve listened bewilderedly from the opposite side of the counter. _For a guy who didn’t argue theology before breakfast, Bruce sure could argue theology before breakfast once you got him going._ He’d been at it a good twenty minutes, with no signs of slowing. “The obvious explanation is usually the correct one.” 

_Regular Energizer Bunny._ But when Bruce was the one doing the arguing, Steve didn’t seem to mind- _as much._ Something to do with those platonic human interaction skills that Pepper was always going on about. _Pepper._ It had been… _three days._ Three days since she'd left for DC and The Brothers Norse had come a’knockin. Not a long stretch of time in the grand scheme of the universe, but it was hard to believe that much time had already passed. The days had whizzed by in a blur of confusion and suspended disbelief. His brain was still trying to catch up with the reality of the first attack. _Aliens. Gods._ He couldn't begin to fathom the idea that the bell for round two was likely about to chime. 

His eyes strayed to his phone, laying beside the plate that contained the now gutted doughnut. _He had to bite the bullet soon, give her a call._ Not that he didn't want like hell to talk to her, but all things as they were, a call meant a lie or the very least, a lie of omission. Pointlessly splitting hairs there, because he doubted he could swallow either option. Lying to Steve, lying to S.H.I.E.L.D about the situation he could handle. Even if lying to Steve was increasingly feeling like the act of booting an over eager puppy in the face. Lying to Pepp, though? The thought made him sick- and _no,_ that wasn’t just the hangover. He'd been down the road of hiding the truth from her once before and had nearly lost her, lost _everything,_ as a result. Could he really risk that a second time? But it was a chance he’d have to take if he was going to have any hope of keeping her safe. The moment she knew what was going on, she'd be jetting back to New York, trying to make him leave and she'd be in the crosshairs. Anyone- _anyone with more than an IQ point to their name,_ would go after her to get to him. 

_No._ At least for now, Pepper couldn't be allowed to find out what was happening, even if that meant lying to her to keep her away. 

Mentally shaking himself of the thought, he refocused, tuned back in to the present. Bruce was still talking to, or rather _at_ Steve. He’d picked up a spoon from the table and was waving it around, gesturing like a professor wielding a laser pointer from behind his lectern. 

“I’m not trying to argue a single root religion,” Bruce said. _So apparently they were still on that._ “But here we have a group of beings, so powerful, so advanced, that ancient man thought they were gods. It’s only logical to conclude that the deities of other religions were similarly inspired. Maybe not by Thor’s people-”

“Oh hell,” Tony said aloud, a cackle forcing itself out as an image formed without warning in his head. 

Stilling mid-rant, Bruce cocked his head to look at him, bushy brows twitching in question. 

_“Jesus_ Thor. Just think of it,” Tony said, grinning, a twinge of pain belatedly reminding him he’d bit a chunk out of his cheek. “The whole getup,” he went on with delight. “Like one of those candles they sell in the Mexican grocery stores.” 

Bruce stared at him for a long, deliberate moment before slowly raising a hand to cover his eyes. He shook his head, breath huffing out in the rhythm of withheld laughter. “I give up,” he groaned. 

Still chuckling to himself, Tony slouched into the backrest of the barstool, tongue making a slow exploration along the inside of his mouth as he looked over to Steve. Taking tactical advantage of the distraction like the good little soldier he was, he’d pulled a folded newspaper from his back pocket and was shaking out the creases. As Steve opened it to the second page, Tony found a blurry tabloid shot of his own face staring back at him. 

IRON MENACE, the headline proclaimed in the Post’s trademark red font. _SENATOR STERN RENEWS DEMANDS TO SEIZE IRON MAN TECHNOLOGY._

With a roll of his eyes, Tony reached for his mug. 

“So they’re on that kick again,” Bruce said. He was peering out from between his fingers, head still held in his hands. 

“Mm hmm,” Tony hummed in agreement through a mouthful of too-hot coffee. It scorched the roof of his mouth, but it was strong and thick as motor oil. _Just the way he liked it._ Well worth the first degree burns. "A real live paper," he went on by way of distraction, pitching the words in a twangy southern drawl. Bruce was still eyeballing the cover, looking ready to say something more; something Stern related, chances were. They'd already debated religion, they didn't need to start in on single-celled organisms. "They still makin’ them things?" he teased. 

"Better get yourself a smartphone, Cap," Bruce said, with a roll of his eyes. Judging by the smirk he was sporting, he hadn't missed Tony's segue. "Wouldn't want to get kicked out of the First World Club."

"Oh no," Tony objected. "No no. No liberal agenda _...ing_ while I'm sober."

 _"Liberal agenda-ing?"_ Bruce began indignantly. _Oh yeah,_ Tony thought, _**now** he had him good and properly distracted._

"I have a phone." At this sudden and decidedly _loud_ announcement from across the counter they both paused to look at Steve. "See?" Steve said, yanking the item in question: a glass and metal conglomeration that could only be an iPhone- out of his coat pocket. He held it triumphantly aloft for them to see, as if he thought they’d suspected him of lying. “I just…” he faltered. “I _like_ the paper, it’s…” he looked away, clearly embarrassed. 

_“Hey,”_ Tony said, after several seconds had passed and Steve continued to stare at the floor. “I get you.” He did. _I want an American cheeseburger,_ he’d told Pepper. It wasn’t about a slab of fried meat, _wasn’t about the news._ It was about needing something familiar in a world that had been turned on its head, a world you no longer recognized. 

Steve still wasn't looking at him. Bruce on the other hand, he realized, was staring like he’d just sprouted a second head. Suddenly the silence was an awkward one. He cleared his throat. “That’s all the better S.H.I.E.L.D could swing?” He asked, forcing a laugh into his voice. Steve’s hand had sunk to the countertop, still holding the phone. Leaning out of his seat far enough to reach, Tony snatched it from his grasp. “What is this, _16 bit?”_

Startled, Steve opened his mouth to protest, started rising from his own stool. Tony motioned him to sit with a distracted wave of his hand. “Cool your engines, Spangly Britches. Just putting myself in the contacts.” _He was,_ in plain fact, going to look through the settings panel for a MEID number, but close enough. 

“You watch him,” Bruce warned. “He got ahold of mine and put himself down as Doctor Perfect Ass. _Who comes up with these titles?”_ This last comment was seemingly directed at the newspaper he was in the process of liberating from Steve’s possession. 

Exhaling loudly, Steve propped his chin on an upturned palm, defeat evident.

“This thing is sad, it makes me sad,” Tony said over the sound Bruce turning pages. He’d found the fourteen digit serial. Quickly committing it to memory he flipped back to the contacts, pulled up the new contact field. “I should set you up with-” _Actually that wasn’t a bad idea. Way easier to monitor his own tech._ “ Yep. That’s it, it’s decided. JARVIS, start fabricating Cap a phone- no wait, make that two. That telegraph machine of Bruce’s gives me straight up manic depression.”

“Certainly, Sir,” JARVIS answered.

“I don’t need-” Bruce began, as Steve spluttered something about him ‘not wanting Tony to go to that kind of trouble.’

“Satellite linkup, cascading holographic displays,” Tony said, cheerily bulldozing over their objections. “Eco friendly,” he added, winking at Bruce. 

Bruce’s eyes rolled so far back in head Tony briefly wonder if he was having a fit. Muttering under his breath, he went back to perusing the paper. A second later the muttering resumed. “How is this second page news?” he said, raising his voice. 

“Everything’s second page news compared to yours truly,” Tony said, typing madly. 

Bruce didn’t dignify that with any kind of reply. _“The badly decomposed bodies of two men were discovered by joggers Friday afternoon in the Central Park Ramble,”_ he read aloud. _“The police have yet to release a statement, but sources close to the investigation say that one of victims in this presumed homicide. . .”_ he trailed off, skimming the rest of the article. “Charming,” he commented a moment later. “Apparently the local wildlife had quite the snack. Oh, and one of them was sans-head.” 

_Was that corpse, or the wildlife?_ Tony wondered. “A rat’s gotta eat,” he said, tossing the phone back to Steve, who deftly snatched it from the air. Relaxing back into his seat with his coffee once more, he a took satisfied chug-

_“Annnthony?”_

-and abruptly choked at the sight of the dark haired woman who, having announced herself with a nails-on-glass pronouncement of his name, was coming up the steps into the kitchen. 

Between hacking coughs, Tony took in the salient features with a doomed man’s calm: the wavy black hair, the bright green eyes that were staring back at him with a predatory glint. She- _he,_ was barefoot; decked out in a men’s dress shirt and nothing else. Tony opened his mouth to say something, but his mind was a blank. 

“I wasn’t aware you had a guest,” Loki said, in that strange alto voice that managed, inexplicably to sound like his own. He smiled at Steve, all wide eyes and concerned frown as he sidled up behind Tony’s chair. 

Bruce had gone stock still, the only sign that he was still breathing, a minute shudder that passed through his hands and into the newspaper. 

“ _Are you Captain America?”_ Loki crooned in surprise. 

Steve was looking ready to crawl under the table and quietly die. If they hadn’t been teetering on the edge of disaster, Tony would have laughed at his expression- something between embarrassed and morbidly fascinated. “Yes, ma’am,” he answered stiffly, a blush spreading across his cheeks. 

“This is umm…she’s the...” Tony articulately opened with, pulse pounding in throat.

“Your secretary?” Steve deadpanned, his mouth a thin, unimpressed line. 

“Something like that,” Loki said and Tony could practically hear him innocently blinking at Steve. 

A warm body pressed up against the parts of Tony’s back not separated by the stool’s backrest, making him jump. He started to squirm away, but Loki’s hand closed firmly on his shoulder, eased him back into his seat. “Aren’t we tense this morning?” he said, giving a warning squeeze. 

Steve had taken a sudden, all consuming interest in a bottle of vanilla coffee creamer, was studying the nutritional label like the survival of the free world was resting on his knowledge of its trans-fat content. 

Steve’s attention averted, Loki inclined his head, hair falling across Tony’s shoulder. “You’ll be pleased to know,” he said in the barest whisper against Tony’s ear and Tony couldn’t contain a shudder at the sensation of warm breath sliding across his skin. “That he’s not another Chitauri masquerader. But then you didn’t stop to consider that before you went bounding down there _alone_ to greet him, _did you?”_

He...had not. Which in hindsight, was pretty goddamn stupid, but he had no way or inclination to respond.

“Perhaps you should learn in a little caution, _Anthony,”_ Loki hissed, the sharp points of his nails digging into the tender flesh just above Tony’s collarbone. “Before you get us all killed.” Hand falling away, he straightened. “A pleasure to meet you Captain,” he said, voice melting back into melodic tones and then he was gone, gliding down the stairs with a parting flutter of fingers over his shoulder. He’d taken Steve’s newspaper _and Tony’s coffee._

“I’ve just got to-” Tony stuttered, pointing after Loki as he slid off the stool. Fuming, he hightailed it down the stairs into the sitting room. Finding that empty, he headed for the stairwell that led to the penthouse's lowest floor. “What the hell JARVIS?” he demanded, taking the steps two at time. 

“I could hardly warn you across the main speakers that he was coming,” JARVIS replied sourly. “If you had your headset, it would make things a good deal easier.” 

“So stop nitpicking and start fabricating,” Tony snapped. “Make some damn backups while you’re at it. Where is he?” 

“Miss Potts’ office, Sir.”

Reaching the bottom of the stairs Tony jogged to the end of the hall. He flung open the office door with a force that smacked it into the adjoining wall. “What was that?” he spat into the echoing crack of doorknob meeting wall. Only then did it register that the figure standing in the center of the room was Thor. 

The blonde gave him a knowing frown, but didn’t speak. His burly arms were folded across his chests and he looked as if he’d been pacing prior to Tony’s arrival. 

“Calm yourself Stark, before you strain something,” Loki said, drawing Tony’s attention away. Now male and thankfully clothed, he was sitting behind the long desk, the absconded newspaper spread out in front of him. 

“Are you _insane?”_ Tony asked through grit teeth. He turned to Thor. “Is he insane?” he repeated. “I mean, _stupid_ insane?”

“Such things,” Thor said, shooting his sibling a sharp look. “Are, I fear, my brother’s idea of humor. There is nothing he quite so delights in as causing trouble.”

Tony looked between the two them in disbelief. “Do you realize,” he began, glare settling on Loki. 

“He realizes,” Thor interrupted. He resumed pacing, deep frown lines creasing his brow. “Stark,” he said, watching Tony from the corner of his eye. “This lying to Captain Rogers, it does not rest well with me. The man is our ally, a brother in arms. He fought bravely beside us, shed blood with us _and now we deceive him?”_

 _Should have seen this one coming,_ Tony mused. _If there was one thing he was beginning to understand about Thor, it was the man’s black and white sense of morality._ Dragging a hand through his hair, Tony regarded him with what he hoped was an understanding expression. 

“Look, lying to Steve; I’m not feeling too choice about that,” he insisted. _“But, Thor,_ I don’t trust him. _Alright?_ I wish I could say that he’s two hundred percent onboard with us, but-” The right words wouldn’t come to him. Growling in frustration, he threw up his hands. “I can’t get a fix on this guy.”

“You believe he’ll fall in league with S.H.I.E.L.D, should it come to choosing sides?” Thor asked, slowing his pace. 

“I sure as hell _hope not._ Thing is, Steve, he’s-it’s all about queen and country with him- _No,”_ he added, pointing a finger at Thor as the bigger man opened his mouth to speak. “-we don’t have a queen, _it’s just an expression._ What I’m saying, _trying to say-_ Steve’s been marching to the ol’ patriotic drumbeat so long. _He’s programed._ I don’t trust him to not go all weakest link on us and run for the trampoline first time Chief One Eye says jump.” 

“Well now,” said Loki dully and leaned back in his chair. He fixed Thor with a sardonic smile. _“Whyever_ does that sound familiar?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's adult conversation and bonding time! . . .minus the bonding part. Honestly though, with the way Steve and Tony were at each other's throats most of the time, I can't imagine them magically getting along after just one time successfully fighting together. 
> 
> A longish chapter this time and a little cameo, tossed in amongst the gore! Hopefully I didn't make anyone (especially Zak! D:) too queasy with my little autopsy scene! 
> 
> All of that aside, I have to take a moment to say how surprised and unbelievably touched I was by everyone's encouragement on the last chapter. I can't even begin to thank everyone enough or express what that meant to me. And if I didn't get around to replying to your individual comment, let me just say now: Thank you, thank you, thank you!


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